The Little Mermaid’s Fortune-Teller

The Little Mermaid’s Fortune-Teller

Refracted through your tide-washed hours, this prince
drifts through algid brine, kelp-wound: his ship has foundered
in your sky. For his sake you discover land, build

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Refracted through your tide-washed hours, this prince
drifts through algid brine, kelp-wound: his ship has foundered
in your sky. For his sake you discover land, build
the castled waves wherein he breathes. (He’ll wake

to a woman who walks like rain, and marry your reflection
in dry eyes.) There is a shore where each step leaves
a print of blood: all along the undertow was listening
for the shadow of his sail, the reefs held out their coral

blades. Gaze into that mirror (above you sea, a sky
below) until the morning you fall through: light changes
color and direction for your sake. Make your bargains
with some witch. There’s a conch shell waiting on the sand

to shred your sole and salt its roar into your landlocked ear,
a shipwrecked whitecap is calling you home.
I could lose myself in those waters, break
like a wave: after three hundred years nowhere

to be found, the knife still dark in my hands,
in my feet and my mute tongue. Call me that foam.

Can we count on you?

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