i was born from
an ocean, tidal wave
crashing background noise and
sizzling foam seashore
rage and salty tears that
burn the back of your
throat on the way down
when you try to sleep but
her seashells are howling
wrath in your ears
so loud your heart gives
in to the moon coaxing
tremors and pieces out
of your bones with every wax
and every wane
until all you are is
shattered crustacean breeze and
unwelcome footsteps bruising the
shoreline every time you
try to scream

i was born from
a man who did not know enough
to cast away his fishing
net far away from a woman
with piranha blood in her veins
and a kraken resting within;
she will tear him
apart
you cannot cage the sea
she has her own rivers and
tributaries like poison
dripping from everything she
hisses at the sky

but i am only the
fire
the gentle, the water in
me has slowly dripped
away until droplets of angry
sun have taken its place
its burning in my
veins
this blood is too dilute
to be set alight this
away
i cannot blame the moon,
sly as she is,
these are no tidal convulsions
i cannot control,
only volcano breath
madness and a thirst for
the burn, the crackle of a
flame of my own
accord

who to blame, who
to blame
she is the sea that howls
endlessly
he is fisherman, trembling as he guts her
away, scale by mirror scale stained
by ****** fingers
that still believe that controlling
nature is what it means to
be man, to deserve woman,
to live and to die underneath
a headstone even the ocean
will dare not touch

and i,
sea salt stings its way through every
inch of my skin
so instead my wildfire heartbeat
thumps lava, desperate to
expel my mother from the
depths of my drowning
lungs

we are not
the same
i don't want her
in me anymore
oh god, why

won't you let me
breathe ashes the
way she breathes
her own sorrow?