Would I Rather Be a Woman or a Fish?

 The NaPoWriMo prompt today: Today we’d like you to start by taking a look at Alicia Ostriker’s poem, “The Blessing of the Old Woman, the Tulip, and the Dog.” Now try your hand at writing your own poem about how a pair or trio very different things would perceive of a blessing or, alternatively, how these very different things would think of something else (luck, grief, happiness, etc).

Remembering that I set myself to explore form this year, I decided to try it as a Rondel – perhaps not one of my better ideas. (But do go and read the prompt poem, which is lovely!)

‘To be exactly where I want –

to be here now, to be human –

how blessed I am!’ said the woman

in the posh seafood restaurant.

The population’s getting scant

for certain fish in the ocean.

To be exactly where you want,

here and now, seems to be human.

For fish, what blessing does life grant?

Just that – the life that they’re given.

They need no other heaven

than to live as long as they’re meant,

to be exactly where they want.