With the engine cut, our world changes.
We are drawn outward, suddenly part of the grey
ocean that surrounds us. Now it is waves, waves we hear, gently slapping, tapping
at the boat’s belly.
Fog subdues sound, reducing it to finite pebbles.
Gull. Distant ship’s whistle. Tap, slap.
There is little to see. In all directions; sky, water,
and fog in three shades of grey. We watch each other for signs of sound. Eyes
widen; heads turn.
A soft blow.
“There.” At the end of my finger and fifty feet out,
a dorsal fin. Then another, smaller.
Two more little explosions of air, like gods blowing
kisses of deepest affection to one other.
Starboard now. Another two – just fins – then
seconds later in the same spot, a small black island surfaces and recedes in
one smooth undulation. Beyond this, just before the fog curtain, another three
fins.
The soft sprays surround us. Backs and fins dot our
sacred seascape and tears blur this vision. A cow and calf come so close my
breath catches. I lick salty fog from my lips. We are surrounded and in this moment,
I am perfect and fluid and I long to go, to glide, to blow, to know what my pod
knows.
But we are left behind, bobbing, going nowhere and
the magical beasts take the dream with them, weaving silk strings in their
wake.
Then the sun cracks through the fog and in its brief
touch I see the threads glisten. I see the pattern. I see the web.
I purse my lips and force them open with a lungful
of air. On the sound of my blow, the messengers return to me, surging forward
effortlessly through the grey sea, through my red blood toward my racing heart.
