From the Fishouse

I follow him all the way inside the light
all the way inside the ice water
until I am on my own.

There I hear something like a Siren,
something that is trying to lead me astray
and meanwhile I’m telling him I know

how to swim, but he makes me breathe underwater
his eyes hard like blue coal, and when I look up
I see the moving bodies laced with flame and time

following the bend like that into the vortex more real
than anything else, and just when I’m there, in the smoke,
his hand in mine, he reaches in, easily, slowly, to the back of my throat

down beyond my rib cage, like they all try to do
his hand squeezing my heart, the beating held still by his hand
the blood suddenly broken from its path, now everywhere.