Transgression
And when the water rises,
Where will I go?
You are all too much and I cannot hold you back.
I creep inland hand and knee and rock and tree,
Swept away.
It all floods and I cannot tell seawater from my tears.
This is not my sweet river, not my solitary lake,
It is vast and timeless,
And years slip out of my fingers.
The soil soaks them in.
It is mud now, thin and grainy and
Years stick to my knees, in the cracks of dry skin.
They get in my mouth and I puke them all back up,
I puke you back up and you shrink away.
When the water rises, and everything melts, and everything
Is hot and early and the snow doesn’t fall and the fish are all dying,
Can I blame you?
When the water rises, and it will,
You will.
Will I float? Will the ocean take me back to where I come from?
I imagine myself beneath the surface,
Weaving through and around kelp forests and jelly fish,
I imagine myself with fins and gills,
I imagine myself hating you, proving to you that I can not drown.
The ocean takes me back,
I, Marea, the tide, (with the moon), go back.
Where will I go?
You are all too much and I cannot hold you back.
I creep inland hand and knee and rock and tree,
Swept away.
It all floods and I cannot tell seawater from my tears.
This is not my sweet river, not my solitary lake,
It is vast and timeless,
And years slip out of my fingers.
The soil soaks them in.
It is mud now, thin and grainy and
Years stick to my knees, in the cracks of dry skin.
They get in my mouth and I puke them all back up,
I puke you back up and you shrink away.
When the water rises, and everything melts, and everything
Is hot and early and the snow doesn’t fall and the fish are all dying,
Can I blame you?
When the water rises, and it will,
You will.
Will I float? Will the ocean take me back to where I come from?
I imagine myself beneath the surface,
Weaving through and around kelp forests and jelly fish,
I imagine myself with fins and gills,
I imagine myself hating you, proving to you that I can not drown.
The ocean takes me back,
I, Marea, the tide, (with the moon), go back.
Amelia (Marea) Tuerk is a junior at the Lehigh Valley Charter High School for the Arts, where she is a Literary Artist. She is published in her school’s literary magazine, Ruckus, and is passionate about writing, activism, and disrupting what is considered comfortable. Amelia enjoys listening to music, crocheting, and spending time at the lake, river, sea, or any other body of water.