My great-great-great-great-great-times-a-million grandmother
was a whale.
And although the Origin of Species never mentions **** sapiens
I own that.
Because just as I have my mother’s calves and my father’s hairline
I have my grandmother’s blowhole.
An evolutionary adaptation to keep me alive
It’s done well so far.
The tides come in and the rains pour down as a flood and monsoon and I feel my lungs burning and I
GASP
At the surface
And I feel my grandmother’s pain.
She is trapped between graceful fish and powerful hippos
Life and death
Lungs underwater
Each deep breath a risk that after diving into the deep
she won’t return
In time.

I am told that I am
The culmination of billions of years of evolution
Why, then, is my blowhole necessary?
I wish I had inherited gills
Because the fear of drowning
Is paralyzing.