half and half

what hurts the most is when people think they are trying to save a drowning body. i have found my comfort here, again, in the water. i'm sinking and i'm sunk and there are no words for the white noise packing into my ears. it feels like sometimes i don't need air. and it is fine to be born a fish, as it is fine to be born a human, but it is harder to be born half fish, half human because there i am, half and half and nothing at all recognizable. there are others like me and we all hide, because we are not like the mermaids in the fairy tales, we are ugly and we are unsightly and we don't like upsetting the fish and the humans. and we are separated because we don't like upsetting each other. we are lonely, but on good days we play, shaking our tail and waving our hand out at the swimmers to keep their fantastical mermaid dreams alive. on the good days they go home thinking they are lucky. what a wonder, to see the beginning of a dream, and what good fortune, to not have to stay for the nightmare that follows.