My Blue Octopus

My Blue Octopus

Kimberly Phinney

I.

In your cloud of arms,
pressing down,
I am dragged:

Oh, you invertebrate!
I am no match for your grip
(eight-fold and tentacled).
My Medusa, my Leviathan—
you blue-ringed,
bulging,
bulbous thing
I am unable
to shake
or swim
without.

II.

In your deep waters
I go
down,
down,
down:

Oh, how you collapse me—
flattened and unrecognizable—
like you,
soft-bodied and disappearing
into
the
smallest
of
spaces.

I am held close—
cradled and anesthetized—
like your prey,
an enveloped nervous system
in your electric glow.

Down,
down,
down
I go.

III:

In your den, so familiar,
I am reminded
how to survive:

Oh, to ask the right questions
of death
and my despair.
Oh, my Blue Octopus!
Are you my predatory guide,
pointing me eight-times
to watch the pearls fly
as they float to the surface—
those miniature pockets of life
I am meant
to trail behind?

Did I hear you mouth,
“Save yourself”
or was it
“Stay a little while”?

I do not know.

Or am I now a part of you?
A scrap of the living
you keep
in your cavern,
going on and on in
our own mythology—
and finally seeing
in our decay
and drowning
that under
great pressure,
we need only
bleed ink
to survive?

---

Kimberly Phinney 
Writer & Teacher 

Kimberly has been published in Calla Press, Heart of Flesh, and Harness Magazine. She has her M.Ed. in English and is an AP English instructor and department head at a Christian college preparatory school. She is currently earning her education doctorate in counseling and community care. You can see more of her work at www.PhinneyPhotography.com. 

Photography by