Poetry by Ciona Nankervis: Born Of The Kelp

Born Of The Kelp

I tried hard to conceal the markers of my aqueous inception.
Pressing palmfuls of sand into my skin
Until it disappeared into my pores;
Turquoise mirror lagoons lapping at cavern walls
Were grains endowed to a wanting dermis,
But my body never did take on the tan of that
roasted earth crumb.

In my arms that undulate like dolphin waves,
The velvet strands befurring my lip,
The unbridled tracks of verdigris
Streaking fugitive from ferrous clasps,
Trailed-teal streamers and stained sea glass floors,
A blood of the ocean-born.

My home, glimmering heartland beneath
Bedecked in the glamorous forests of the deep;
Reach up from the billowing silt and break
through the ocean mantle
Where light splits muddy ink water
Like sanctity.
Iridescent spires of blue tourmaline are these
Towering
Marine cathedrals, cased in
Jade of ghoulish slippery-slime.

Way out here, I am Entity:
Call me by the runes of obsidian serpentine,
The intoxicating euphonies of
Rooting and Resurrection
rippling through the gloom;
Here I am, Sea Wytch, Lady Kelp, Chlorophyllis,
Infinite Spacewater Enchantress.