Familiars

Author: Brooklyn Copeland Seall

Publisher: The Economy Press (2024)

SWIM

Among the sudsy grass,
the beer cans, the magenta fronds

of bottlerocket cast
to their beds of unnatural debris,

some fish, known near-anonymously
as bass have nested and bred all June,

too brazen to ignore, too small to eat.

I am suddenly every mother who evolved
from every armless mother who swam.

I’m ankle-deep on a tepid beach,
watching them watching me,

unholy among the ungodly,
the air itself so silly.