6
Three Poems by mariel Fechik
In Which I Leave to Find the Hope Diamond
One morning I wake up in your bed to find my
stomach wrapped completely in coral.
Thinking it must have come from the storm
last night, the one where the ocean uprooted
itself and roared through the streets, I think
nothing of it and attempt to pry the white bone
from my skin. It will not budge, and the
parrotfish that’s curled around my wrist snaps
its beak at me. I call for you, but you're busy
rinsing brine from the sink drains, and have no
time to deal with my calcification. I reach to
my hair, only to find a stubborn piece of brain
coral clinging to the side of my face. I call for
you once again, but the electric eel in the living
room is threatening the cords. I resign myself
to a life of anemones and kelp, until you come
from the other room with pliers and crack open
the bright arms that have sealed meto the
sheets. There, you tell me. Happy?
I lie still on the bed for a moment before
slipping out the window into murky water.