Anglers
By Ali Shapiro



I.

I watched you pry open
the sharp lips of the shells,
the kitchen air thick
with salt, the smell
of ocean. And there
in the clear liquor lay suspended
the severed, simple life.
Your eyes drifted closed
over the slow spread
of a smile. The slick
gray meat glistened, and
was gone. I watched the flickering
in your throat. The swallowing
whole. This is why my ribcage
interlocks its boney fingers
across my heart, clenched
like a fist.

II.

I slipped the toe of my boot
under the discarded armor
of a horseshoe crab that lay
on the scuffed line of the tide,
flipped it over to find
the curved inside wall brocaded
with mussels, clustered black
and numerous like the cells
of some cancer – the body reduced
to tenement, a brown bowl
like a soldier’s helmet. I went on
down the frozen beach, tracking
the wreckage: the vacant
shells, the blunted glass, the seaweed
tangled like hair.

III.

It’s not you. It’s what
I’ll do to you. And I can see it
even now, even clutching
at the air around your body, trying
to bring you closer. Once you get
deep enough so that water
swallows light, there are fish
who dangle iridescent lures
before their toothed mouths.
Now listen closely, darling.
Now follow my voice in the dark.
It’s not me. It’s the way
you’ll open for me, your mouth,
your legs, your raw
meat heart.

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