CPR
Nur’aishah Shafiq Flesh thwacks against stone with a violent slap. The fish flails, tail
flapping, delicate folds of skin are gaping mouths gasping, collapse of gills. I too cannot breathe, scramble to rescue, armed with makeshift home
of pail, the little creature slipping my fingers trembling
with intended deliverance, my hands a failed gentleness.
Little body shudders, unwilling
to settle in the cup of my palms ready to soothe seizure, by the waiting room
of bucket, while vast
ocean of pond is scrubbed. In the end, I must scoop— a crude gesture. Waiting
until little sack of meat goes limp, resigned
to breathlessness. But I make
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