Porpoise

This morning I pulled a porpoise from the sea:
Without thinking I reached in,
plucked it out
With my small hands
And laid it on the pier.

The porpoise looked me in the eye
Without suggestion or idea
And I wondered
What it knew.

What could it tell me of gravity
And sunlight
And the way water warms
And cools and the pleasure
Of spinning through the ocean
Without fear of falling?

What could it tell me of depth
And pressure
And the power of the currents
That wrestle below
And the view of the clouds
As they pass without sound?

What could it tell me of fish
And of flavour
And the hundred varieties
Of edible squid
And the texture of seaweed
Along the curve of a fin?

What could it tell me of ships
And of movement
And the progress of hulls
Through the skin of the sea
And the cut of the oar
In the flesh of the beast?

What could it tell me of people
And kindness
And the spilt information
That crosses the chasm
Between air and the ocean
In unreadable words?

What could it tell me I wondered
As the porpoise looked into my eye
With the start of a smile
that may not have been there.

Without thinking I rolled it
Back in to the sea
And watched as it faded
And paled from my view
Still laden with the glory
I imagined it knew.