HELP: Bishop - thwarts, strings, gunnels

[Anna Plisetskaya]

Dear SEELANGERS,

I am translating into Russian a poem by Elizabeth Bishop "The Fish", and
there are some lines at the end of it I don't quite understand. The heroine
sitting in a boat has caught a big fish. I cannot understand some parts of
the boat, especially strings:


I stared and stared
and victory filled up
the little rented boat,
from the pool of bilge
where oil had spread a rainbow
around the rusted engine
to the bailer rusted orange,
the sun-cracked thwarts,
the oarlocks on their strings,
the gunnels--until everything
was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!
And I let the fish go.


The dictionaries give "banka na grebnoy shlyupke" for "thwart" and
"planshir" for "gunnel". It still remains obscure for me but "oarlocks on
their strings" are totally beyond my understanding.

I would be very grateful for any ideas as it is rather urgent.

Best,
Anna

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