The week after I left the island,

it was Shark Week on Discovery.

Sure, I’d chosen to forget; in salty

surf, murky waters, there were apex

predators, the same way sex

is impossible, scalloped-edged, sad. Obscured

from view, it was a dolphin’s dorsal

that crested the waves. In my pink cowgirl

pajamas, face illuminated by the flicker

of a tiger shark snatching an albatross at the surface,

I ached for the serrated rows of teeth.

Renée K. Nicholson is a former ballet dancer. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing at West Virginia University. Her work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Chelsea, Mid American Review, Paste, The Honey Land Review, Naugatuck River Review and The Gettysburg Review. Her blog can be found at http://thenicholsphere.blogspot.com/.