Callie S. Blackstone
I told people about the octopus we saw at the Peabody Museum
but we both know it’s actually a squid,
its sleek body trailed by ten appendages—
two tentacles, eight arms. The large yellow marble
of its eye looms over the lobby. I told people about the octopus
and how we stood under it, curtained
by suction cups. There was no octopus. There was you—
dark eyes obscured by your glasses
and your military service. You told me
the frames issued by the Army
were nicknamed birth control glasses,
BCGs. I laughed, my world defined
by my desire for your gaze.
There was no octopus. There was my desire
to tame an eldritch beast. The model of the squid
still hangs years later, tentacles splayed out
behind it. No privacy, no embrace, no warmth. A cold ribbon
of freedom that greets museum visitors.
I pause to take it in, the copper glory
of its thirty-five feet. A man pauses, turns to me,
quips that it’s ugly, belongs in a thrift store,
and moves on. Its eye watches
as he goes.
“My work is an ongoing dialogue with myself—past, present, future—and this poem responds to one I had published about the octopus. Here, I was ready to step away from the fantasy and acknowledge the reality of what our relationship was. When I visited the Peabody Museum recently I learned that the squid had been shipped to Canada for repairs. The docent informed me that this was the only squid on display at the museum (equipped with 3D printed suction cups,) but I suspect that she’s actually an octopus.” —Callie S. Blackstone
Callie S. Blackstone writes both poetry and prose. Her work has been featured in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Rust+Moth, and elsewhere. She has been nominated for the Pushcart and a Best of the Net. Her debut chapbook, sing eternal, is available through Bottlecap Press. Her online home is calliesblackstone.com.