Shipping mountains of expanse it gains the above,
a smooth sheen of aphotic immensity
gate-crashes the sky.
We watch as a vast inclination to be enormous
break free of the tenebrous deep.
It has now a ribbed and scalloped identity,
it is the depth made manifest.
I can no longer calibrate my mind, as the booming whale
surges past my physical insignificance.
That night
I could feel my fingernails growing in my sleep,
my thickening backbone stretching to crane upward
into an arching leviathan flight,
while my own shriveled and shed skin
sinks downwards to become mere morsels
for soft-mouthed bottom feeders.
Aquatic colossus breaches with elation,
crystalline baubles spray towards
periwinkle skies as casting flukes sway.
In expanse of brine play the descendants
of millennia old warriors; their songs
eco among the macrophyte gardens.
They know the secrets of ancient sailors,
these Balaenoptera musculus in their clan-pods
carry the wisdom of unknown worlds within Gaia’s
womb. A harmonic constitutional for these
hearts of compassion, the annual migration
will glean offspring to carry on the tradition
and guardianship of esoterica; this star
has come far and whispered her secrets
only to the wise ones.
4-22-2021
ALL YOURS (Apr 23) Poetry Contest
Brian Strand
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