Beyond a knife-sharp edge of blue berg,
another
anvil of ice overhangs turgid seas.
Crystalline tops spew salty veils
from windswept summits.
The all-one sky-land, is heavy with snow.
Seals slide across ice floes,
slip into deep waters,
click signals to pups.
This is
an unsteady place, all is layering, breaking,
shifting.
Many horizons present themselves
briefly,
the sun is unhinged, missing,
clarity evades.
In pale lichen-grey light, slabs of ice spilt,
upheave minerals from permafrost.
Explosions thwack the narwhal’s sonic buzzing,
a steel hull breaks through gelid ice.
There were/are animals here: bear, owl, fox,
whiter than the whiteness,
scent marking transitions with yellow.
Long distance: Iqaluk, Inuit fisherman, poised,
spear arm raised,
delicious in his tiny-ness
smudged, rubbed, stained,
erased.
Ann Westgarth
