Let My Elements Go

by Ryder De’Ath

And vague eyes make them ready for the sea
horizons cannot limit. Fish I am
or am this deep, dark mane I toss and turn
down under from the voices here between

white horses and the colder line of deep.
Unwatered sound disturbs the corridor
above the silent coldness hammering
these bones and yet I dive. Forever dive

from ham-stout handed hemp and tar unsaved,
donated to the ship of fools who fear
what lies beneath them. May they never learn
pain augurs pain. The sonar scuffs my skin;

aye aye the whalerman’s wet ire: this is
a song of earth and water, not of fire.