your sea cow

the headlines read that manatees are no longer endangered~

their numbers are increasing, maybe because they live longer now~

or perhaps some, such as I, 

have adapted to colder waters~ 

munching sea-grass below~

gently rocking your boats on our shoulders as you drift under glittering night skies and dream of mermaids wearing 

prettier faces and clamshells on their breasts~

we, the sea cows, wear nothing but the admiration of the glinting salt crystals dried in your white whiskers~

our faces are soft and gibbous~

our bodies are swollen with kelp and swallowed hope~

we are smooth and friendly and buoyant~

we will outlive all you captains~

we are the selkies of the west atlantic shores, our coats carried out with the tide~

we know that you don't know, but it is us that you dream about~

not as we are,

but as you would like us to be~

you press on toward the horizon searching for a sighting~

never knowing that we swam right beside you as far as we could~

we are no longer endangered~

some, such as I, adapted to the coldness of staying behind~

we are holding the shore while you drift in fantasy~

we are holding the memory of your beards on our hide, long after you captains are lost beyond the vanishing point.