You Marry a Mermaid
You marry a mermaid and the first month you spend on land, teaching her about citrus. Lemons. Limes. Grapefruits. But not grapes?
No, grapes are not citrus.
You love the way she says "grapefruit."
You marry a mermaid and the second month you spend under water, learning about coral, tides. How sound flows differently.
You marry a mermaid and you spend the third month on land teaching her about warm colors. Red, yellow. Pink. They exist underwater, of course, but they appear different here, this atmosphere (air) splitting the prism differently than that atmosphere (water).
You marry a mermaid and you spend the fourth month under water learning about heat. You have heat on land, of course, but here there are volcanoes, minuscule to what you think of as a volcano. She teaches you how to enjoy the liminal space between the scalding water and the icy ocean depths.
You marry a mermaid and you spend the fifth month on land teaching her about potatoes. She makes a delightful sound when she tries her first fried potato. The texture almost unbearably crispy. You spend three days on a boardwalk eating potatoes.
...when she tries cheese... on potatoes...
The memory of that expression on her face is worth every jewel, every coin, ever to pass through your fingers, from birth to death.
You marry a mermaid and you spend the sixth month under water learning about the color blue. You think you know the color blue, you've seen the sky, you've seen birds.
She cups your face with her webbed hands and stares at you with an intensity you did not realize could be experienced in mortal flesh and asks you to say Blue.
She loves how you say the word, how your tongue
curls like a wave to craft the sound
where speaking is so different
because your tongue is reacting to a throat full of air
not water filtered into something breathable
You spend every other month on land, the opposing under water.
