December 2024
Bio Note: Once upon a time (or, more specifically, 2004) I managed to earn a Ph.D. in English at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where I taught poetry and poetics for fifteen years. My work has appeared in many poetry publications, and I'm also the author of three full-length poetry collections and several chapbooks. Currently I'm attempting to master the intricacies of playing the ukulele. Wish me luck.
To a Young Diver
So long, silversides.
The lips of the sea
close over you.
I watch you shimmer
and vanish into
the inverted garden
where minnows flock
like sparrows
and tiny pods of air
sequin the powdered
shoulders of
the reef.
Deeper: obsidian walls
flicker with mystery—
fish are flame, coral sways
to the throb of
the young planet
in its skin.
Down there
you are only a fold
in the water, a mote
in time—yesterday spreads
beneath you, silent
as bedrock
while the future presses
upward: a helix rising
through pre-Cambrian blue
brightening
to gem turquoise
as you break the surface
streaming gold, festooned
with your tangled cargo,
your frieze of stars.
©2024 Marilyn Taylor
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