Whale Watch at Mobile Bay

Like God, fog is omnipresent.
I hear whales blow,
smell the sharp tang of fish in the air,
but not one back do I see;
not one raised fluke,
no tangible manifestation
beyond the pronounced fish smell,
like testimony at a trial,
all circumstantial.

With fog in full surround,
memory makes clear to the mind
what we cannot see
and certainly will never touch.
Still, it’s plain to see
with whales we are bound together.
Absent air, whales and men must die.
Still men deny,
push aside, work to disremember.

The choice is ours,
but, all things said, we are foolish.
Our deaths and theirs
give truth to the beauty of life
and provide an anchor
to gladness on which we depend,
so that hope bleeds through
and connects our past
to whales’ futures
and so to nurture.

By birth we're baptized a member
and given place
in time by memory’s recapture:
Some call it grace
though the only space whales inhabit
is wet and cold
and as dangerous as icebergs.
Still, we have heard whales sing
beyond the limits of our ken,

so must admit whales know
more about their lives than we do,
yet in yearning sing
beyond the reach of our ears.
We stand on the deck of a boat
while they are driven
to thrust their bodies into air,
then to crash down
and return to the darkness they own.

They send their moans ocean wide
where mammals can’t breathe
and so make clear
we share two dimensions of fear:
increasingly relevant despair
at the loss of freedom
and the nightmare of being held down
under water until we drown.