• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

VoiceCatcher

support • inspire • empower

header-right

Main navigation

  • Our Team
  • About
    • Our Board
    • Our Story
  • Donate
  • Submissions
  • March 7, 2021
  • Spring & Fall 2020
  • Contents
  • Prose
    • Apostate Child
    • Offense Taken
    • Hechizo
    • Times Like These
  • Poetry
    • Hatched
    • The Goose
    • Nye Beach
    • Scrabble
    • Fitful Tempest
    • With Apologies to Mary Oliver (1935-2019)
    • To the spider clinging to the windshield of my Honda Fit
    • Nancy Drew’s Fancy
    • Sighs of the Mermaid
    • Sir Nicholas the Brave (Lai Poem)
    • Time Off in Coastal Oregon
    • Menopause
    • What It Is to Eat
    • My Grandmother’s China
    • Beautiful Strangers
    • Iguana
    • This Is What We Know

Sighs of the Mermaid

Posted on 01.20.21 by Alison Cantrell

Poetry by Linda Ferguson

                   Say a mermaid meets a man
                                                       who’s handsome, and drowning.

                                    Say she swims him to shore and gets him breathing again,
          and when Handsome opens his eyes,
                                                              she instantly grows a pair of legs,
      helps him home,
            helps him out of his sodden swimming trunks
                  enjoys his kisses and a soft bath scented with mint
                            and lavender—
                                                                              so many things to like
                                  on land with him—
                   the aroma of fresh toast coming from the kitchen,
                                                                         restaurants, candles, a tablecloth,
                                       she learns to pour pools of pale green olive oil
                         onto white plates and let pieces of warm bread soak it up
                                                                                    like a sea sponge—
      so strange to sit, though, while eating—
                                                        what an effort not to undulate
                              her legs beneath the table—
                                                   and where are the tiny teacup-shaped barnacles,
                                    the lacy bouquets of algae, the pale pink shrimp that once tiptoed
                                                            over her fins?

      While he’s at the office, she goes to the track and finds she can’t
                                                            run as fast as she could (once) swim—

  now she sits on the couch and reads help wanteds and realizes she must
          a) learn how to drive
                b) explore the depths of data entry
                      or c) serve ice cream.

          Sometimes he feeds her strawberries from his garden—
                                                                                              how can he know
                             she longs for the slick, green taste
                                                                                    of salt?

Sometimes she awakens in the airless night to find
                                           his leg flung over her like an anchor from an iron ship.
                     As an underwater ballet
                                                            of minutes and hours wave by,
                              she stares at the ceiling and imagines him
                         sailing off on some new journey—
                                                                                    would her fins grow back
                     if his fingers got tangled
                                             in another woman’s hair?

                     Sometimes a whisper of flame flickers in her heart—
                                           if only it would ignite into a full-fledged conflagration—

                              as long as she doesn’t weep—
                                                                                    a single tear could turn his house
                     into a silent pond, and she, like a shimmering koi,
                                           could end up circling just below its surface
                              for a hundred years
                                                                                    or more.


Linda Ferguson has won awards for her poetry and lyrical nonfiction and been nominated for a Pushcart Prize for both fiction and poetry. Her poetry chapbook, Baila Conmigo, was published by Dancing Girl Press. As a writing teacher, she has a passion for helping students find their voice and explore new territory. Find her at bylindaferguson.blogspot.com.

 

Reader Interactions

sidebar

Blog Sidebar

Don't miss out!

Current
IssueRead Now
Previous
IssuesRead Now

Announcements

Jan 27

VoiceCatcher Seeks Volunteers for 2021 Team

Mar 12

Notes from the President

Sep 19

Conversations with Writers & 9 Bridges Present Suzanne Sigafoos

Portland, Oregon

Site by Edee Lemonier

VoiceCatcher, All Rights Reserved