LindaAnn Lo Schiavo

Run-away Bride (or The Mermaid’s Lament)

Bree made a wish inspired by broke girls
In fairytales, not realizing then
Mist magic isn’t free. Before smoke curled
For dinnertime, she quit the sea for him.

Her human limbs are pale, not powerful
Like mermaids’ tails. They can’t kick hard enough,
Return Bree to the deep blue beautiful
Realm underwater, force that made her tough.

Their wedding lullabied anxiety
Away. Then moods wrecked her loveboat. And she’d
Draw baths, avoiding his society
To sink beneath, imagining seaweed,

That salt encrusted skin, fins, cool order
She’d dreamt of giving up. He built their pool.
The shoals and eddies of chlorined waters
Are hers to rule now, cruelly fooled.