Same old shark, same old shark, same old
shark whirled round, and yet
if you could press your hand through glass
you would greet your bones pulling back
and watch your scream sink deep to silence.

Miraculous and absurd, wound
round in emotionless motion,
a snowglobe of fish and reflection.
They stare, we stare, you stare, I stare…

A ring of the trapped and barely living
turns round and round in tinted green,
smell of salt and Sulphur,
stagnant well of everlasting nowhere.

They come again, pulled by invisible
baited threads, the fish in wands of pied
insanity, a huge turtle steering for lost
constellations, shark’s mouth an open wound.

This mirror involves us in indecision,
longing for stars to call us to freedom,
dreaming of heaven rivers draped in light,
and planets ripe and rich enough to eat.

About the poet: Sean Lause is a professor of English at Rhodes State College in Lima, Ohio. His poems have appeared in The Minnesota Review, Another Chicago Magazine, The Alaska Quarterly, Atlanta Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, The Pedestal, Illuminations and Poetry International. He has published two books of poetry, Bestiary of Souls (FutureCycle Press, 2013) and Wakeful Fathers and Dreaming Sons (Orchard Street Press, 2018).