Once More to See You Burial at Sea

Once More to See You // Brigitte Gong

Burial at Sea // Carla Belloch-Arango I choke on salt water as it rakes its claws down my throat, this is one knife I can swallow that will bring me closer to home. Eyes on the sky imply you have learned how to float but I’m treading water amongst clouds of white foam. Ripples, turn to currents, turn to riptides, turn to waves; I’m seasick, yet I know, I’ll find no peace on the shore. So I’ll descend to the depths of these watery graves to at last sleep with skeletons on the soft ocean floor. But there are a thousand ways to drown without running out of breath, a hundred different reasons a heart keeps beating after death: Lungs lined with sea salt where pressure is building, sand in cracked bones where marrow is missing. Yet ribs carved from shipwrecks refuse to sink twice, and coral-sharp teeth bite down like a vise. I bring the reef to my skin for the kill, and watch blood bubble up like an oil spill. Bury me at sea; that’s where I belong. Don’t ever look for me; I found my siren song.