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Writer's pictureL.eX | Literary Excellence

Mermaid Cove by Emma Wells

Updated: Sep 29, 2022


Art by Del Mulroooney



Mermaid Cove


Early dawn invites them,

fin-tailed and fantastical,

into my Radox-fuelled bath;

they encircle me like rings

glimmering silver-incandescence

as they dive and frolic

searching for pearls.


Above the bath-top rim

I see their enclosed cove,

apart, private, mythological;

a dragon’s flame-soaked kiss

emits from a cave

as a candle at dinner,

warm and wholesome,

as the waters I now spin within.


One mermaid sits atop my knee;

raven locks frame her figure,

coiling as sea snakes,

lustrous as seaweed-polished pearls.


We become friends:

I speak of Christmas, dear family

as she narrates tales of the sea;

her seal kin play in the tub

adding acted embellishments

as she speaks; they are playful children,

holding onto each uttered word.


I wash in seaweed,

enjoy its purifying slithers;

it cleanses my urban skin

with beads of marine,

toxic-free, gleefully missing plastics.


Bath water darkens:

is a myriad swirl of jade;

where mermaids turn to seals,

mackerel-trimmed skins

flash and blink at me

from rivulet waters.


Morphing between myths,

I plunge myself under the soapy blue,

breathing in their legends,

blowing bubbles as I surface,

like a newly bathed child

readying for fairytales as I slumber.



Photo by Alice Alinari





The Author


Emma is a mother and English teacher. She has poetry published with and by: The World’s Greatest Anthology, The League of Poets, The Lake, The Beckindale Poetry Journal, Dreich Magazine amongst others. She also has published a number of short stories and her first novel, Shelley’s Sisterhood, is due to be published shortly.





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