We turned around and she was there

stranded between shore and sea,

beach filled with the oily smell of  whale,

her dark tonnage serenading the waves

for the comforting echoes of others,

her great fins offering sand flowers

to the Great Ocean God for her salvation.

 

We mistook her motion for the final dance,

the soprano voice for a lamentation,

the agitation of her great tail for death gasps

for in our experience we are slippery skin

creatures destined to loneliness,

defined to be Ahabs to her kind.

 

The incoming tide heard her prayer and

navigated the sand to slowly release her to

re-float with the high tide, the deeper water

where she be well with herself.

 

And we sat on the beach and watched

her swim out knowing that

the sea can easily swallow a whale.