"Coelacanth"

In honor of National Poetry Month, I have posted work by myself each Friday. This poem is an ode to a preserved ancient fish, thought to be extinct until its rediscovery in 1938, which was on display, hovering, fixed in a large tank of formaldehyde in a darkened room at the original Beaux-Arts-style Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco.

Coelacanth

so alone,
swimming in thick ooze,
covered with plates
but soft underneath.
seeing the bones,
feeling the complex
prehistoric structure
with my mind.
squeezed like a grape,
you will pop.
a head like a potato
or a fetus,
bloated,
white and dripping--
you keep a secret very well

©JEF 1987