Cargo
“This afternoon at 1407 Pacific Daylight Time, J35 (Tahlequah) vigorously chased a school of
salmon with her pod-mates in mid-Haro Strait…no longer carrying the deceased baby that she
had carried for at least seventeen days and 1,000 miles. Her tour of grief is now over.”
—Center for Whale Research
Perilous mother, I wonder what compelled you
to let her leave your body after all. Lifting
her against the slick arch of your back, dodging gulls
that surely trailed, dropping where you breached her body
blushed and bloating with the passing days. We lay claim
to your likeness—salvors to heartbreak, your human
quality, wishing to know whether the soul’s cargo
is more buoyant in the wake of salt or sorrow.
As a child, I watched a man cut the belly
of a shark in the name of science—a mother!
he exclaimed; the hook still lodged in her bloody mouth.
The researcher asks the press: What can be beyond grief?
describing how we need you, christening you
for the glimpse of her flotsam face pressed against
your forehead, her fin gripped in your now gentle jaw.
Watch
As the old boat pulls from harbor
we are restless, shifting in metal benches
of the upper deck, wind scouring our cheeks,
raincoats holding soggy bones
We wait in naive silence, moved in cadence
of waves swelling and cresting beneath us,
chorus of engines starting and stopping,
hushing to hum until we give up again
Someone else eyes the spectral green glowing
from beneath the boat, slowly surfacing
to meet the gray October air. We swarm
the rails, captain calling over megaphone
From the back of the crowd I catch
a glimpse of the scarred fins: dusted
chalk white like a blackboard
in erasure. I feel sorry for all of us
Rocking back and forth on this charcoal sea,
coastline miles from our sight, when I spot
a small warbler barreling toward the boat, swift tuft
of yellow body bracketed inside the bleary blue
She hovers at the height of deck, settling
on its edge. Resting there, her small black eyes
taking note. How human to believe our worth
is in our witness of the world. We are desperate
To be recognized, reflected in the cloudy iris
of another creature’s gaze meeting ours
from the other side. To be perceived. To mean.
Soon, the whales sink back to their depths
Crowd disperses, settling into seats.
The songbird breaks into flight, quickly
as she came, fighting wind with wing, setting
toward some purpose that isn’t mine to see.
Nina C. Peláez is a poet, educator, and cultural producer based in Maui, Hawaiʻi whose work explores themes of adoption, dislocation, diasporic identity, mythology, and ecology. A Best New Poets nominee, her work has recently appeared or is forthcoming in Prairie Schooner, Narrative, Electric Literature, Rattle, Willow Springs, Pleiades and swamp pink, among others. She was awarded the Coniston Prize by Radar Poetry and has been supported by Tin House, Yaddo, AWP’s Writer to Writer Program, and the Key West Literary Seminars. She holds an MFA from Bennington College and is a mentor for The Adroit Journal. www.ninapelaez.com