“Hold up a moment,” I said to Colin, and we pulled up beneath a rocky ledge on a limestone spur that led out in the deep purple of the twilight to a light house, its beam a sudden radiance of light that swept around the bay.

“This isn’t a wait-and-return job, is it?” he asked nervously.

“I’m afraid it is. How close can you get me to the actual wrecking of the Hesperus?”

He sucked in air through his teeth and scratched his nose. “During the gale itself, not close at all. The reef of Norman’s Woe during the storm is not somewhere you’d like to be. Forget the wind and the rain—it’s the cold.”

I knew what he meant. Poetry was an emotional roller coaster of a form that could heighten the senses almost beyond straining. The sun was always brighter, the skies bluer, and forests steamed six times as much after a summer shower and felt twelve times earthier. Love was ten times stronger, and happiness, hope and charity rose to a level that made your head spin with giddy well-being. On the other side of the coin, it also made the darker side of existence twenty times worse—tragedy and despair were bleaker, more malevolent. As the saying goes, “They don’t do nuffing by half measures down at Poetry.”

“So how close?” I asked.

“Daybreak, three verses from the end.”

“Okay,” I said, “let’s do it.”

He released the handbrake and motored slowly forward. The light moved from twilight to dawn as we entered “The Wreck of the Hesperus.” The sky was still leaden, and a stiff wind scoured the foreshore, even though the worst of the storm had passed. The taxi drew to a halt on the sea beach, and I opened the door and stepped out. I suddenly felt a feeling of strong loss and despair, but knowing full well that these were simply emotions seeping out of the overcharged fabric of the poem, I attempted to give it no heed. Colin got out as well, and we exchanged nervous looks. The sea beach was littered with the wreckage of the Hesperus, reduced to little more than matchwood by the gale. I pulled my jacket collar close against the wind and trudged up the shoreline.

“What are we looking for?” asked Colin, who had joined me.

“Remains of a yellow tour bus,” I said, “or a tasteless blue jacket with large checks.”

“Nothing too specific, then?”