seamaid

Boot it ill to claim

this sort of travail, this travel

as a crime, this climb

to the top of the bottom of the heap

and at least it was not so deep

as the last dream

where you swam like a fish

across the scratching sand

and every breath was strangling

with your jewel skin streaked all ruby red

and the whole world a facet, a faucet

with the light turned off

with no water flowing

How to handle that dream but to dive

again and dare some transformation

so it is and so it shall be

but what worse curse this

with women's wiles and fishy styles

half-soul, half-flesh

and nothing doing.

Don't call it travel-- this travail

you half thing in water, in air

dragging your descendants

through evolution.