Dead Whales Ain’t Fairy Tales

a whale is beached
the baby breach—Mothers cut open ashore
the gray haired woman, slapped a boot in the brackish, bloody puddle.
she wanted to know, she said
why why why

the other-halves, too,
who look when “hemorrhaging” sloshes their ears
why the woman fingered the baleen, why the nurse said, “Oh, that’s so nasty.”
never standing vigil along the coast-spanning spine,
putrid smell sailing the wind.

why they took pictures
why they said a prayer (why?)
why they walked back down the beach as if they knew each other
then She didn’t know the baby
who sipped … breathed … her blood

now She knows it all.
She: The one with the open abdomen
gulls pecking at flesh, women standing around as if She cannot hear—
—a damn thing. That’s so nasty.
the smell, taste, sight.