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Playing hooky on a Honolulu Wednesday workday,
warm and weightless a fathom or a little more
below the surface of the sea,
David Fischer turned his masked face skyward
and performed what to some might seem
a boy-like act of voyeurism,
though Fischer’s age was forty-three.
Fish followed Fischer as Fischer
followed the objects of his observation,
two bikinied women in sun-rimmed silhouette.
Like that of the unnoticed man beneath them,
each surface swimmer’s face had been erased.
The features were concealed behind
rubber-framed reflective glass.
Lips were stretched and purpled
by the mouthpiece of a thick, bright snorkel.
Fischer had not seen them on the shore.
Since he hadn’t seen the women on the beach,
his fantasies were free to reach
beyond the limits of terrestrial truths:
the women’s ages, eyes, and noses,
the outer garments they had worn,
their straightened teeth, perhaps,
their towels, bags, and stained straw mats,
the genres of their soft-bound books,
accents, grammar, and emotions,
the shine and scent of sweat and lotions.
Had they chatted with another man?
Dave had not seen them on the sand.
A glimpse, a glance, the features blurred.
“Voyeurism”? Too slow a word.
In forty seconds
Fischer’s head began to throb,
his lungs began to burn.
He swam up to the top
and, gulping air, he floated near
the nameless shameless bodies
bobbing on the surging sea.
His mask magnified the mermaids,
the knotty net of crocheted top,
the bubbles clinging to a rib, the
hills and valley of a dimpled derrière
a length of leg, oh, carnal cares!
A glimpse, a glance, a wordless wish,
the flutter and flash of flesh and fish.
Abruptly, David Fischer turned
and swiftly swam away.
He’d had his glimpse, and the sea’s embrace.
Dave did not desire a face to face.
♦
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