Migraine as Whale: A Triptych

i

Your wusband and some locals charter a whale-watching
tour in the North Pacific Ocean. The surf is huge—
rough weather moving in tomorrow.

The boat carves celadon waves into midnight navy depths.
All day you scan the horizon for humpback whales until
the captain cuts the engine.

Surface tension gives way to a whale’s bumpy tubercles,
her tuxedo shirt throat grooves, you’re met with her
distrustful orbiting eye. Something shifts in you.

After the catamaran pitches back to harbor, the other
parties disembark. But the horizon continues to lurch
like the unsteady hull of a ship.

Except now, it’s the walls of the apartment. The kitchen
stove, the pendant lights, even the blankets insist on this
heaving motion. Everywhere you sight land, the ocean’s
undulation echoes.

As best you can, you surrender to the waves. I am a boat,
you say. I am a wave. I am a whale. I am a whale’s iris.

But you awaken to brain coral for a skull. Ocean tackle
lacerates your bottom lip. Trawling nets sink your quads.
Wherever you go, your pant legs pour sand.

You’ve already missed so much work, you drift to the
subway. Today you’re slated to present your research
to the department chair.

When you confess your new body to a colleague
at the elevator bank, she says, but you don’t look sick.

ii

Your wusband and some locals charter a whale watching
tour in the North Pacific Ocean. The surf is huge—
rough weather moving in tomorrow.

The boat carves celadon waves into midnight navy depths.
All day you scan the horizon for humpback whales until
the captain cuts the engine.

Surface tension gives way to a whale’s bumpy tubercles,
her tuxedo shirt throat grooves, you’re met with her
distrustful orbiting eye. Something shifts in you.

After the catamaran pitches back to harbor, the other
parties disembark. But the horizon continues to lurch
like the unsteady hull of a ship.

Except now, it’s the walls of the apartment. The kitchen
stove, the pendant lights, even the blankets insist on this
heaving motion. Everywhere you sight land, the ocean’s
undulation echoes.

As best you can, you surrender to the waves. I am a boat,
you say. I am a wave. I am a whale. I am a whale’s iris.

But you awaken to brain coral for a skull. Ocean tackle
lacerates your bottom lip. Trawling nets sink your quads.
Wherever you go, your pant legs pour sand.

You’ve already missed so much work, you drift to the
subway. Today you’re slated to present your research
to the department chair.

When you confess your new body to a colleague
at the elevator bank, she says, but you don’t look sick.

iii

Your wusband and some locals charter a whale-watching
tour in the North Pacific Ocean. The surf is huge—
rough weather moving in tomorrow.

The boat carves celadon waves into midnight navy depths.
All day you scan the horizon for humpback whales until
the captain cuts the engine.

Surface tension gives way to a whale’s bumpy tubercles,
her tuxedo shirt throat grooves, you’re met with her
distrustful orbiting eye. Something shifts in you.

After the catamaran pitches back to harbor, the other
parties disembark. But the horizon continues to lurch
like the unsteady hull of a ship.

Except now, it’s the walls of the apartment. The kitchen
stove, the pendant lights, even the blankets insist on this
heaving motion. Everywhere you sight land, the ocean’s
undulation echoes.

As best you can, you surrender to the waves. I am a boat,
you say. I am a wave. I am a whale. I am a whale’s iris.

But you, awaken to brain coral for a skull. Ocean tackle
lacerates your bottom lip. Trawling nets sink your quads.
Wherever you go, your pant legs pour sand.

You’ve already missed so much work, you drift to the
subway. Today you’re slated to present your research
to the department chair.

When you confess your new body to a colleague
at the elevator bank, she says, but you don’t look sick.