parting the waters

sleek and beautiful, like the waves that caress
her sensuous form, the Selke slides into my soul.
parting my pain like the waters before her.
sharing her dreams like the foam of her passage
between the reefs of lost destinies and suitors
torn apart on the coral of self-contemplation.


stealing the skin

I lay in wait until the shadows 
danced at the waters edge
and the selke no longer knew 
or cared if anyone saw her 
there, playing in the shallows.  

I crept up and gently took 
the shed skin into my arms,
awakening the Selke's sense
of self preservation.  But to no
avail.  For now I held her token.

She begged me to return it that
she might return to the depths,
but I was more prisoner than her,
caught by the grace of her mortal 
form, warm and gentle and beautiful.

And so we sat, for a day and a night,
trapped by magic and passion and soft
ocean winds that carried no sign
of danger to break our puzzled reveries,
building to a legend and a revelation.


another world

there is another world beneath the waves.
where sapphire blue and emerald green
are commonplace, but beautiful.  I have seen
it with my own eyes.  and any man who braves
the waters must risk more than his breath.
he must risk his heart in the infinite arms
of the sea creatures and she creatures whose charms
would drag him down to a fate far from death.


returning to the liquid sands

like water through my hands
the liquid sands of the oceans
of my heart.  burned by mystery.
betrayed by pain.  kissed by god.
and shared willingly, too willingly
to live long in peace.  I cease
the waterclock and count the drops
that have fallen while waiting 
for answers locked in the embrace
of feral predators and fools.  jewels
left in the clearing to catch 
the troubadour unaware.  but the
water never lies.  never lies.
and an honest lover never dies.


from the cliffs

wind made not by the coming dawn
but by the knifing of her form through
the warm sky as she catches a gravity
wave and rides it into the embrace
of the sea god.  she rises from the surf
and the earth greedily laps the dripping
saline from her body as she climbs again
to the highest cleft, to dare for love again.
unashamed.  unbroken.  and full of hope.


bodysurfing on percale

riding the wave to the edge of the world.
then back again.
an explorer's sin
of arrogance and curiosity.
majesty and surrender.
engendering the evidence
of a night trapped in the crest
of a wave never anticipated.
but welcomed.  repeatedly.


the Selke smiles

with a puff of her breath
the Selke smiles that Mona Lisa
memory of hers and blows
a parting kiss to the poet
on the rocks.  his body healing 
from the despair of the descent,
kissed back to life by the magic
of a creature of myth.  and with
a gentle tug of her skin, she vanishes
beneath the foaming emerald sea.


copyright William F. DeVault (wfdv)