We carry the sea inside ourselves.
We admire her from the safety of a blanket,
perched high in the dunes,
safe from riptides and undertows.
Beyond the sandbars and shoals,
where the green goes to blue,
the sea keeps her secrets.
The Selkie woman aches
for her sea mother's cold embrace.
She yearns in silent slavery on the land.
The sealskin a fisherman stole from her
is hidden away, a secret trophy.
One day she will find it and escape
to tell her tale to the whales.
The drowned and those buried at sea
share a bed where seals and whales will not linger.
Their mistress rolls the kelp and bears the otter on her back.
She brings her lovers oyster pearls and Spanish treasure
but never brings them home.
They grow richer and colder than any miser,
kept consorts in her empire of mud and rock.
Other poems in this series:
Three Turns of Seven in the Earth
Three Turns of Seven in the Air
Three Turns of Seven in the Fire