Status: Re-uploaded 20/09/12.
The Sea Breathes
Sink
Dawn shatters across the sea’s naked back, and I say goodbye to it.
Today, I am a submarine, contained within myself. I carry my oxygen on my back. It is the only home I need, just as the turtles that swim around me carry their homes in the form of polished, jade carapaces.
I am in the sea, feeling her cool caress. She tickles and fondles me, teasing and leading me down sandy trails through forests of kelp. I skim the bottom of the ocean floor, feeling the soft silt that has settled in dunes like a dry desert. This is part of the continental shelf, meaning that it is like the sea’s collarbone; the last, visible slope of her neckline before it plunges down to her hidden breasts. I brush it again with my fingers.
Today, she wears a necklace of glittering gold as schools of fish migrate up the coast. I tangle it as I fight against the undercurrent, following her directions. The fish scatter and regroup, and I apologise.
I am heading towards a reef, which grows bright out of the darkness up ahead. There will be no boats here, where the sea has erected jagged barricades to scrape and splinter their hulls.
Few beachgoers, too, dare to venture barefoot over the oysters, or to wade in shorts through the rock pools where blue-ringed octopi drift, pulsing poisonously, while needled conidae lurk like assassins. The sea has hired them to guard this spot for us. I am in my thick wetsuit, and so they cannot harm me.
The reef is private, and as it spills over dazzling sands in the shallow water, I see that my muse is also an artist. Here, amidst rocks and sunken gullies teeming with life, she has crafted a city.
She has carved twisting spires and gentle arches, piling high the rubble. She has built palaces sturdier than the sandcastles she knocks down, planting them with gardens of seaweed and coral, sponges and swaying, tendriled anenomies. Clownfish are the peacocks on her lawn, and starfish the koi in her ponds. Jewel-like angelfish and shrimp with delicate legs like piped glass are her comely courtesans.
I am delighted.
Oh, sea! I think, What will you show me next? What further, magical sights remain to be written into our affair, embossed in shining black like the ink of squids or the blood of sea urchins beneath my fluted pen?
She taps me on the shoulder.
Today, I am a submarine, contained within myself. I carry my oxygen on my back. It is the only home I need, just as the turtles that swim around me carry their homes in the form of polished, jade carapaces.
I am in the sea, feeling her cool caress. She tickles and fondles me, teasing and leading me down sandy trails through forests of kelp. I skim the bottom of the ocean floor, feeling the soft silt that has settled in dunes like a dry desert. This is part of the continental shelf, meaning that it is like the sea’s collarbone; the last, visible slope of her neckline before it plunges down to her hidden breasts. I brush it again with my fingers.
Today, she wears a necklace of glittering gold as schools of fish migrate up the coast. I tangle it as I fight against the undercurrent, following her directions. The fish scatter and regroup, and I apologise.
I am heading towards a reef, which grows bright out of the darkness up ahead. There will be no boats here, where the sea has erected jagged barricades to scrape and splinter their hulls.
Few beachgoers, too, dare to venture barefoot over the oysters, or to wade in shorts through the rock pools where blue-ringed octopi drift, pulsing poisonously, while needled conidae lurk like assassins. The sea has hired them to guard this spot for us. I am in my thick wetsuit, and so they cannot harm me.
The reef is private, and as it spills over dazzling sands in the shallow water, I see that my muse is also an artist. Here, amidst rocks and sunken gullies teeming with life, she has crafted a city.
She has carved twisting spires and gentle arches, piling high the rubble. She has built palaces sturdier than the sandcastles she knocks down, planting them with gardens of seaweed and coral, sponges and swaying, tendriled anenomies. Clownfish are the peacocks on her lawn, and starfish the koi in her ponds. Jewel-like angelfish and shrimp with delicate legs like piped glass are her comely courtesans.
I am delighted.
Oh, sea! I think, What will you show me next? What further, magical sights remain to be written into our affair, embossed in shining black like the ink of squids or the blood of sea urchins beneath my fluted pen?
She taps me on the shoulder.