The manatee’s slow, heavy dignity
His movements, careful, searching, grazing, sure
Magic-porridge-pot-snout digging for more
Mournful, shadowed, aged eyes, stare darkly
He’s pulled by a deep curiosity
Unwary giant, close to the shore
No enemies, a friend on the sea floor
Rising, ponderous, poised, just so he can see
But he rises to a hull’s black shadow
Drawn by the spinning of blurred propellers
He hears it, feels it, a pulse rippling
His huge flanks. Rising, rising, shallow
His grey skin, his short flippers, his whiskers
A human evolution of scarring