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Angie Minkin

IMMERSION

The longer we float, finning, the more we want.
At first, we thought nothing of running
into Zihuatanejo Bay’s gentle waves,
diving under, snorkeling with rainbow
wrasses, yellow filefish, cobalt durgons.
Iridescent pinks, vivid greens,
spotted black dogfish, hiding in reefs.
Our breath comes easy, skin turns to salt.
Beneath us, stingrays lurk on the seabed
and jellies drift by, born as soft polyps,
now wild adolescent medusas, long blue
tentacles trailing invisible harpoons.
One innocent brush—barbs of pain tattoo
our skin. How do we reckon the ocean,
even this quiet bay? Learn from such
piercing? Isn’t that what we want?
A little wiser, a little more cautious,
to run back to the water?

 

About the writer:
Angie Minkin is an award-winning San Francisco-based poet whose work has been published or is forthcoming in Birdy Magazine, Concho River Review, DASH Literary Journal, El Portal Literary Journal, Lips Poetry Magazine, Loch Raven Review, The MacGuffin, Rattle, The Poeming Pigeon, Stirring: A Literary Collection, The Unbroken Journal, The Westchester Review, and others. She is a coauthor of Dreams and Blessings: Six Visionary Poets. Her work has been included in Fog and Light, San Francisco through the Eyes of the Poets Who Live Here and Pandemic Puzzle Poems. Her chapbook, Balm for the Living, will be published in 2023.

Image: Fisherman’s Cottage by Harald Sohlberg (1869-1935). Oil on canvas. 42.9 x 37 inches. 1906. Public domain.

OJAL Art Incorporated, publishing since 2017 as OPEN: Journal of Arts & Letters (O:JA&L) and its imprint Buttonhook Press, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation supporting writers and artists worldwide.

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