When he keeps trying to steer my chin
towards his lighthouse face
despite my whispered insistence that my lips are not lost ships
He sees fit to flash that charming smile and rescue me still.
He is a sailor he says
and knows these seas well
I remind him that I am a mermaid
and know them deeper.
It's just a kiss, darlin'
and my no slips under my tongue polite as pearls.
It's just another inch of your scales onto land

When I do not boat floor thrash against him
My gasping is taken for excited consent
My skin drying out under his touch for playing hard to get

Mermaids are taught early to kneel on ocean floors
praying for a sailor to win us from the water
and carry us home like a carnival goldfish
to never be frigid
to never be ungrateful for the kindness of a man
who has not trapped us

or tangled us up in nets
who did not even harpoon our lovely flesh.

I swam to his shore curious
smiled even
O, how I smiled right up and even through this crime
a gentle rocking crime I did not recognize
until I woke up gutted
fins split
with a mistrust for sailors
my backbone pulled through my skin.