What were once perhaps arms have simplified in time
to water wings, undulant and white in a black sea
pearled and catacombed with ice.
                                              Pelvis has vanished,
or is at most vestigial, tapering to feet turned tail fin
in a slow fan-dance of somnolent propulsion,
dream-lazy, ghostly.
                          Her call, her only weapon,
is sonar deadly, a stun gun, prelude
to instant swallowing and digestion, death
under anesthetic.
                           The world of stars and sun
and the hard crust of earth
betrayed her, though she visits still,
white in the white moonlight—
                                       the dome of her mind
grown huge and forgiving in the cave of the sea.