Aquarium, and Birthmark

Abstract

Aquarium, and Birthmark William Fargason (bio) Aquarium You want to keep feeding the fishinside you, but you keep eating the fish because you’re hungry.This is not the way it should go. No one said you would not be hungry.You knew the dimensions of the aquarium inside you, knew it was inside you.She who fogged the glass didn’t know that you’d eaten the fish, but you did and do.You hear the aquarium inside your chest crack, and before you know it, the carpetis soaked with bleached coral, plastic kelp, and multi-colored gravel.This is not the way it should go. This is not how anyone should go under—the water that you contained now contains you. [End Page 26] Birthmark When ducks come in to land on a lake,they cup their wings inward to slow themselvesdown. I told her that’s what the birthmark on the inside of her right thigh looked like.A drake mallard. A wood duck. Its outlineagainst the sky at daybreak. She traced my kneecap with her finger, said she was tryingto memorize every detail of me for whenwe wouldn’t see each other again. I didn’t tell her I was doing the same. My father used to take mebird hunting, back before I moved away. Doves,he said, flew different from the rest. They didn’t flap their wings quite as fast, or as frantic; they flewmore smoothly than finches or sparrows. He madesure I aimed ahead of the target to make up for the space the bird would fly once I pulled the trigger.Leading the bird, he called it. Don’t aim for wherethe bird is, he said, aim for where the bird will be. [End Page 27] William Fargason William Fargason received a BA in English from Auburn University. His poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in New Orleans Review, Eclectica Magazine, Grist, Nashville Review, Bayou Magazine, New World Writing, and other publications. He is currently a poetry MFA candidate at the University of Maryland, where he teaches creative writing. He lives with himself in Hyattsville, Maryland. Copyright © 2014 Middlebury College Publications