Hall of Fishes
We’re in front of the giant kelp forest habitat at the aquarium as part of the spring tide of visitors. There is an immense grouper passing slowly back and forth inches from the glass. This fish remains unperturbed when several grade school aged kids tap on the tank. Its body seems almost weightless in the flickering blue-green water lit from above. A placard tells us a little more about groupers. They start out as females and when they are sexually mature they can change to males. Only the largest females change gender. The process is irreversible. I also learn my niece has a tattoo that my sister doesn’t know about and poor body image runs in our family. We rarely wear shorts or sleeveless shirts in public. When an argument breaks out in the alcove, we move along in the Hall of Fishes. Moon jellies drift inverted. Their most visible organs are the four milky white, horseshoe-shaped gonads. The pulses of their bell-shaped bodies are in sync then out of sync. We never finish our conversation about therapists. For $25 patrons can adopt a fish. The grouper is likely already taken.
whelk shell
riddled with holes . . .
what the sea takes back