You say
the watercolor sun of the sea does not issue impressionists
your body sleek as department store women with poreless faces and
once worn clothing. You, who shimmer, flash,
and burst into the season's latest rage in mating colors,
astonishing the sand flung in dazzling arcs by your long, devilish tail.
I say
the weight of the air I must eject from my body is enough to stain
this vertebrate only once. Jet-propelled precision chromatophores
are fine, but we don't believe in equivocal dye-jobs, we who hoard
our ocean beneath our skins.
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