ISSUE 3 · FALL 2009
Copyright © 2009 Nicelle Davis | Sideshow Serpentina: the Last of the Split- Tailed Mermaids NICELLE DAVIS
The poster shows her bare- breasted. Areola painted pink on yellow paper, a picture of heat, stage lights focus on the wet split of legs, one limb pulls into the loops of the other.
Nickel crowds, line to see the boneless woman. Un- ossified, she lays a rag draped on planks. A man, taken by her inescapable need, buys himself fresh fish off the ice at Market.
On the trolley, rolling fingers over scales, he feels her blonde curls. Home, unwrapping trout, newsprint damp, ink bled, he hates himself for thinking he could have
such shimmer, such silver.
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Nicelle Davis lives in Southern California with her son J.J. Selections from her In the Circus of You, a collaborative work with illustrator Cheryl Gross, appeared in Issue 6 of A cappella Zoo. Her other poems have appeared or are forthcoming in several journals, including Broadsided, elimae, PANK, Pedestal Magazine, and Transcurrents. She’d like to acknowledge her poetry family at the University of California, Riverside and Antelope Valley Community College. She runs a free online poetry workshop at The Bees’ Knees Blog and is assistant poetry editor for Connotation Press.