Tuna

Tuna Olivia Sio Tse (bio) One more thing about the zoowas its life-size, bluefin tuna we carriedon stilts, palm to palm. Papermache to remind us how every slick little slice is plucked from somethingwider. We lowered it slow, to keepdown the thumping. This fish permittedshared touch, a hamper of praising fingers. Was I envious? Marching? Myother hand jammed Smart Seafoodpamphlets into the parents heyif you tell me what to eat one more time I'll get farther away from home. Pennedin all the regular ways. Nothingis so bad, barrettes with patterns, a testsite of them. I only controlled the edge of my case, not its unknowable soupand pulse. Under a big-ticket fish, plentysore but never even swum.Swung and paraded for tips, this fish has got no lineage except paper and glue.Mandarin ducks exchange crucialnews in the pond at night. When I neededto park, I knew the zoo to be refuge a secret ranch put on the odometer.The tops are confirmed to be crystal. Myvoice has always been a whistle, cutclean, oily when not fresh, slab of smooth [End Page 28] Olivia Sio Tse Olivia Sio Tse is a poet from Texas. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Second Factory, Bennington Review, Denver Quarterly, and elsewhere. She is a recent graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop.