As Easy as Swimming
by Patricia Davis-Muffett
Seventeen long months, this child grows,
learning her mother’s voice
as she searches, tireless,
for the dwindling salmon.
Finally, the calf emerges, swims.
No more than thirty minutes––
she is gone. The child, imagined, hoped-for,
the future of a dwindling breed.
What was it that made her
keep the vigil, risk herself,
to keep this child afloat seventeen long days,
1000 miles, nudging her toward air?
Was she convinced
she could save her child
make her whole again––this being
she loved already, as it slipped from sea to sea?
Those nine long months I carried you
as my mother slipped away.
Laboring in water, my head beneath the surface
as I fought the urge to scream.
Finally, your whole self in the world,
no matter my imperfect carrying,
Here you are, the rush of love immediate.
I would do anything to buoy you toward air.
Thirteen years. Still miraculous, alive.
This summer, that orca mother
carries another calf. As if this is
as easy as swimming, she continues.
learning her mother’s voice
as she searches, tireless,
for the dwindling salmon.
Finally, the calf emerges, swims.
No more than thirty minutes––
she is gone. The child, imagined, hoped-for,
the future of a dwindling breed.
What was it that made her
keep the vigil, risk herself,
to keep this child afloat seventeen long days,
1000 miles, nudging her toward air?
Was she convinced
she could save her child
make her whole again––this being
she loved already, as it slipped from sea to sea?
Those nine long months I carried you
as my mother slipped away.
Laboring in water, my head beneath the surface
as I fought the urge to scream.
Finally, your whole self in the world,
no matter my imperfect carrying,
Here you are, the rush of love immediate.
I would do anything to buoy you toward air.
Thirteen years. Still miraculous, alive.
This summer, that orca mother
carries another calf. As if this is
as easy as swimming, she continues.
Patricia Davis-Muffett (she/her) holds an MFA from the University of Minnesota. She was a 2020 Julia Darling Poetry Prize finalist and received First Honorable Mention in the 2021 Joe Gouveia OuterMost Poetry Contest. Her work has appeared in Limestone, Coal City Review, Neologism, and The Orchards, among others. She lives in Rockville, Maryland with her husband, three children, one good dog, one bad puppy, and one demon cat.