Boy, she may be fire
but you cannot conjure me
from nothingness. Unlike the spark
of flint on stone,
I am no man’s mistress.
I am the mother of your mother, boy
and I remember the first rains,
so sweet and so soft.

Boy, I have birthed lily pads and pyramids
and the hanging gardens of Babylon.
I hide fish that fly and whales with horns
and squid with blood-red eyes.
Some nights the earth shudders
and I spit out islands, crowned in fire.
You say you can swim, boy
but have you ever been swallowed by a whale?

Boy, you mapped me, sailed me,
said you owned me,
birch canoes and coracles,
so fragile on my endless waters.
You fought me with the very trees
I watered, but I tore your wings to tatters
and gobbled up your oars.
You cry for krakens and maelstroms, boy
but my swells roll on and on.

Boy, I sank the Titanic.
Imagine, the night so pale and gleaming,
smokestacks screaming, black hull tilting
down and down and down.
I drowned Atlantis while you stared,
transfixed by my pearlescence,
my heart of green and turquoise.
You had better build yourself an ark, boy
because my fury is a hurricane.