I lied about the whales. Fantastical blue water-dwellers, big, slow moaners of the coastal. I never saw them. Not once in that whole frozen year. Sure, I saw the raw white gannets hit the waves so hard it could have been a showy blow hole. But I knew it wasn't. Sometimes you just want something so hard you have to lie about it, so you can hold it in your mouth for a minute, how real hunger has a real taste. Someone once told me gannets, those voracious sea birds of the North Atlantic chill, go blind from the height and speed of their dives. But that, too, is a lie. Gannets never go blind and they certainly never die.
this is where i'll put my thoughts when i think them