Late last night I dared descend
Liquid halls to apprehend--
Born in deepest ocean cradle--
Life forms served from the Maker’s ladle.

I dreamed of strange frames in  their retreat:
Starfish  fingers that walked like feet,
Octopi’s -- feet with head and eyes,
Corals walls--  built when polyps die.

Seahorse was a head astride a tail,
Saw a slithery eel, the sluggish snail,
And schools of  fish in every color
That drifted currents or dove for cover .

Saw swimming free,  a fat manatee.
And stuck on a rock,  the anemone.
Half of  ‘cuda was a  toothy jaw,
But scariest was  shark’s  bloody maw.
                                   
Crabs walked sideways where  tides seeped,
While albacore explored the deep.
Sea caves and shells held  lazy mollusks.
Even saw kelp’s  undulating forests.

I glimpsed a world rarely seen--
Filled  with  curiosities--
But lacking gills,  I did surmise:
Fish  yet remained  unseen by eyes.

first published in Poet’s Pen (Society of American Poets),
                       also Poets of the Vineyard Anthology, 2002

© 2000 Bonnie Manion