August 18, 2016The AquaristPriscilla Atkins

Before his wife and children absconded

with the house

and left him to his fish life

in the garage—rows of aquariums

lined up where one would expect

tools, lawnmowers, badminton sets—

there had been dreams,

delicate and webbed

as underwater wisteria.

Now his days pass

in half-liquid, half-light:

like specific gravity,

the essentials have no unit of measure.

What’s the difference between

one tank and ten? Ten and a hundred?

Every morning, with a flick of a switch,

possibility descends

in fluorescent white robes,

sifting across the backdrop

of motor-hum and gurgling filter.

His little sausage fingers navigate baby tears

and water lettuce like flippers:

let’s transplant those tiger barbs

and tetras,

trim this African fern,

breed the indigo fighting fish.

At night, curled in the middle

of his damp mattress,

he listens for the swish of veiltail

and bleeding heart,

while constellations of stars

flicker through a darkened window.