Poems by Courtney Hitson
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Bull Shark Scuba Dive
For Octavio
by Courtney Hitson
From Canary Summer 2024
Courtney currently resides in the southernmost point of the United States. Every day, the island manages to upturn a new surprise—be it a sunset of unfathomably fierce color or a batch of nurse shark pups swimming along the pier. The planet’s precarious situation displays itself more and more, each season. She uses poetry as a means to deal with this reality.
With a bucket of dead fish, we drop
into the estuary as they unwind
idle circles around our path.
We’ve become rote,
as in remembered, meaning
that I mingle in this soul’s
grey head with fleeing marlin, maimed
octopuses, and a lineage, coded
450 million years long.
The sand exudes a sacredness that I’m hesitant
to embrace. See, sharks survived all,
five mass extinctions. Unsaddled
by stockpiles of selves or compasses, overstuffed
with needles, they’ll likely outlive us.
The campy bite of a movie
poster’s garland—bloody teeth decked
in menace—pales to these masters, looming
beyond every apocalypse.
I write this poem 7,000 feet above the earth
where a seatmate cranes to watch
my videos of the feed, Octavio dangling his halibut
like a matador. The 747’s silhouette graces
the ocean—our own pelagic shadow, grim and bound
for the city.
© Courtney Hitson