Fish

I glide.
because I don’t know how to stop.
because the water doesn't ask questions.
because it’s easier than swimming against something.

when you pull me out
I don’t fight.
I hang.
still, dripping.
my skin shrivels in air,
scales peel off like petals,
you think they’re decoration.

rough hands
turn me over.
not to study—
to use.
to weigh me.
to feel if I’m worth keeping.

you laugh.
you dunk me.
you say, “just a joke.”
my gills flutter.
you don’t read fish.
you don’t speak fish.
my “no” is bubbles.
my “stop” is glassy-eyed and polite.

I remember the last time
someone held me under.
long enough
to make my body forget the surface.

I am not the fish you wanted.
but you decorate me anyway.
lace me with flowers
before stuffing me with your expectations.
stuff me with your laugh.
stuff me with everything you think I should have wanted.

the ocean takes me back.
cold, like forgetting.
blue, like silence.
I mostly float

Sometimes I sink
hide under rocks
to remember what it felt like
before the hands,
before the hooks,
before the performance.

my fish-body is
strange.
slick and split.
chipped where it used to shine.
I want to melt.
I want to dissolve.
I want to be water
not fish.

there are other fish in the sea.
I watch them.
I don’t speak.
they think I’m shy.
I am protective.
I am warning.
I am not your catch.
I am the one that got away
and still drowned.

I am a fish
present me with flowers
but I smell the bait on your fingers.