In Love with a Selkie

I grew shrill in wanting her, in calling to her from the shore,
in promising her anything, manic with regret.
She cared not, out in the estuary, floating on her back,
eating small bony fish and shrugging off my love.

Even when I overlooked the stench of rotten fish on her breath,
she scoffed at me.  When I was at my worst, when I gave her roses,
how her eyes smiled, as she edged back towards the surf,
trailing the flowers from her fingers.

Then months of nothing.  The redwoods dripped with rain.
The stray grey cat stayed a while, then left.
Back to waiting by the shore, seeing the empty rockery,
even the occasional seal, but where was she?

The woman I never fully believed in.
The Irish myth brought alive in Northern California.
She who broke my shifting expectations,
who scurried back to the water’s edge at the first sign of a fight.

When she came home pregnant, she took my hand,
placed it on her belly.  I pulled my hand away.
We sat on the sofa, as she put her pelt away in its box.
I longed to put a knife through it, to keep her here with me.

“This time I’m visiting until the baby is born.”  “Visiting?”
Her skin was still damp, with its boathouse algae smell.
I could hear the ocean in her voice.  The selkie in her was still awake.
“We’ll call her Riannon,” she said.  I simply held her hand.