'Learning to Drown' by Faith Allington

The waves thunder and foam on the shore. Under a purple sky, the moon’s white as a new tooth. Ghost ships follow moons like these, their rotted hulls drifting on the silver-black sea.

On nights like these, you come to me by dream. The damp wind stains my curtains algae-green. Your chest shimmers, abalone shells armoring your heart. Your mouth splits wide, fish-eyes bright, tentacles reaching.

My cheek is salt-crusted where you touch me. Moon-drawn, I will follow you even to the ocean floor. I feel your teeth nibbling at me, my ankles translucent as jellyfish. Kiss me quick, before my lungs fill with water and my skin unravels in spirals of kelp.

Your voice rises over coral and rock, urging me onward. I want to become salt, to exist here with you, waves breaking and falling and us at the heart of their forever, weightless. 

 

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Faith Allington (she/her) is a writer, gardener and lover of mystery parties. Her work appears in journals such as Apex Magazine, Waterwheel Review, Flash Frontier, Cease, Cows, and Crow & Cross Keys.