Mother, give your daughter to the sea

Keep her from the waves no longer.

Humanity is not a gift, mother.

See, now, how they curse at her?

See, now, how she hides from them?

The sea is a blessing

 its forests woven from silk and 

its people always changing.

There is room for anonymity there.

Your daughter, mother, does not belong here

And the waves want her more than the ocean can bear.

Mother, your daughter

Can’t you see?

The sun in her doesn’t burn as bright as the magma does.

Your daughter, mother, should be free

Where she walks without falling

And sleeps without dreaming

In the darkness of the trenches.

In the shadows of those faults.

And mother, you should know

She yearns for the sea as the sea yearns for her

The ships and the birds, the rocks and the fish call her name.

She calls back, mother, in a voice that the lonely whales can only imagine.

So mother, can you remember?

The salt on your tongue, the violence in your heart?

Do you remember 

The beat of your pulse as storms brewed within your arms, 

The crush of ships against your breasts?

Mother, do you remember your daughter, born of you and the sea, the same?

Do you see her, eyes blue as the depths, hair tangled like fish nets?

Power in the smallest puddle, gentle as a stream.

Like the tides, she changes,

Her heart waxing and waning with the moon.

The cliffs, mother. You see those cliffs forever, endlessly. Their white faces mock you.

Your daughter knows those cliffs well.

There was a man on them, mother, his hair as dark as trust and as rich as wine.

You know the rest, mother. You have seen your daughter’s back too many times to be remembered.

Mother, you know how the tide

Chases footsteps.

Men are weak. This is their flaw. They hoard treasure, but they cannot hold it.

The names become lost, confused.

How comfortable, for a while,

To be another forgotten thing.

Your daughter misses you, sea-mother.

She is at the cliffs, her chest bared and her hair long around her neck.

So mother, mother,

Give your daughter back to the sea.