Whale Heat, Penny Harter

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With Whales

Whale Heat
Penny Harter
for Scott McVay

Whales dive into frigid waters,
float far beneath the swells,
their great hearts fueling
the heat of their flesh
as they drift
among luminous bottom fish.

In the dark night of the oceans,
in the millions of years before
we were there to hear them,
whale songs lit the Earth
with echoes, arced between
the stars.

When whalers rip their bellies
and drag their gutted bodies
through cold seas,
whales are caves hoarding sun,
for even after death
the heat of their decay
seethes in their bones.

~~~~~~~~~~~
Penny Harter was born in 1940. Her work appears in magazines and anthologies worldwide. Her most recent books are Lizard Light: Poems from the Earth and Buried in the Sky. She is a teaching artist for the Arts-in-Education program sponsored by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts; for more information on her teaching, workshops, and writing, please visit http://penhart.home.att.net. This poem was previously published in her book Lizard Light: Poems from the Earth (Santa Fe, N.M.: Sherman Asher, © 1998) and is reprinted by permission of the author.