seal bride

by Jennifer Mace

the tide has made an orphan of this crevice, has
cast these jagged boulders from the ocean.
if I sit here, the sun will sip salt from my skin,
run hungry fingers across the dapples of my pelt.

I will dry like kelp laid in vast furled sheets
across the basalt, like haddock peeled &
strung out over hickory flame, like an abalone
plucked from its shell: made safe for consumption
but always, always longing for the sea.

Jennifer Mace is a queer Brit who roams the Pacific Northwest in search of tea and interesting plant life. A three-time Hugo-finalist podcaster for her work with Be The Serpent, she writes about strange magic and the cracks that form in society. Her short fiction has appeared in Cast of Wonders and Baffling, while her poetry may be found in Reckoning and Uncanny. Her anthology Silk & Steel: An Adventure Anthology of Queer Ladies, with co-editors Janine Southard and Django Wexler, may be found through Cantina Press. Find her online at www.englishmace.com.