Somehow he knows he can breathe in both
water and air. See how he grows piscine,
dull on land, iridescent in the deep.
Delicate flesh of my blood and my bone.
How many bodies can this world hold?
Men want to examine where exactly
skin meets scale. You can’t have it both ways,
choose: man or fish? Not a man, say the men.
Don’t listen to them, sing the sirens,
preening their feathers (being as they are
part woman, part bird). What will the fish say?
Neptune, I’m counting on you in your pearl
and coral grotto, where distinctions are not
so brightly lit, where sea horses are not
horses, where starfish are not fish, but stars.
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