Tasnuva Hayden
Low Tide Everything that should have tasted sweet tasted rusty, or maybe everything that should have tasted rusty tasted bitter, or even, thinking back, a little salty. On the morning they found the stranger, wrapped in kelp and seaweed, I’d caught a cold. Three weeks later you said, “nice to meet you” and topped it up with a whip-cream smile. You have what my aunt calls calculating eyes. Could you tell that I went a little weak? Pretending that you came here for me. That you keep coming back for me. That you’re not here to measure the vanishing ice. That the Sami and their dying languages are not enough to keep you occupied. You tell me “it begins when it begins”. Convinced that the vetehinen aren’t real. But then, men with wings have existed since prehistory. White-blue hermit crabs still fell on the water that day. The doctor kneeled next to the stranger’s body, checking antilang. no. 3
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