Species that Shatter
By Seana C
A glass penguin sits in my bathroom, quotidian, though,
His spirit dives with his kind through the currents of the ocean
A fragile friend sits next to him, his only company
Unlike his colonies that marched to battle against the storms
This friend’s flipper was shattered from a fall it endured
Similar to the falls of the glaciers that continue to shatter the species
His attire, striking hues and pellucid curves
Differing to his uncoloured, stark fellows
Just as the purity of the tones those fellows clothe in
Differs to the tainted marine blue that their hearts surround
Within my little penguin, holds what keeps him tethered to his sort;
In the depths of the blues, framing his globose belly;
There are but so very few fish
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This poem was highly commended for Poetry Object 2019
'I loved the originality of this piece. This little object that lives in a bathroom represents the real struggle pretty much all marine species are facing. The weight of the world on his tiny shattered flipper. This poem reflects perhaps the fragile hopeless way so many of us feel when thinking about climate change, the anxiety of the future and the guilt of the past. It’s a metaphor within a metaphor that gives some beautifully expressed language and then at the end delivers the truth bomb that clarifies the poem’s whole reason for being.'
~ Emilie Zoey Baker, Judge, Poetry Object 2019
