Mid-western Selkie Girl

by Jennifer Schomburg Kanke


Moon, make fishes of falling leaves
and kelp of waving goldenrod,
this whole world underwater.
Give her space she has never known
in a land-locked, day-locked life.

Do not abandon her to the sun,
and the brittle cracking things
crunching so easily underfoot.
Let her drift in your waves
as if sharks will never smell
her new blood, as if she will never
be caught in an undertow, forgetting
the only way out—stop struggling,
swim parallel to shore.



Jennifer Schomburg Kanke's work has appeared or is forthcoming in Pleiades, Prairie Schooner and Court Green. She recently won 2nd place in the Dwarf Form category in the Science Fiction Poetry Association's annual contest. Her favorite fruit right now is persimmons, but sometimes it's pineapples, and bananas and blueberries are always a good go-to.

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