Degeneration

1.


Shipping routes intersect
at the point when you say,
"You know who she is."

     This sting ray drops from your mouth 
as if you were a sea monster swallowing
the ocean.  You speak 

     as if you cannot gut us in a minute.
     From across the table, you say,

"Which one could she be?"

Your tentacles extend into hidden niches, 
constrict fish.

In my coral reef, you met her.


2.

Your ship is full of holes, on the
open waters, you have no direction.

The sailors use flares, signal SOS, and still
you steer her aground, wreck her
masts,
       cast away her ballast,

change course, take in tack, sail 
before the wind, ...

anything to avoid the dry dock,
to never come to a landing again.


3.

I would like to drown you in an oil spill, 
coat your feathers in slick death,

string each of your primordial ganglion, blow air 
into your gills, dehydrate your wetlands, pierce
the plates of your exoskeleton, flood
your freshwater with salt, rip

fins off your body,

until nothing swims or crawls in your biosphere.

Instead, I find myself
offering a palmful of water lilies.