The Only Surviving Species of the Genus Carcharodon

The great white shark swims
twenty feet of predator
evolution
A boneless tail goes side
to side
in a steady beat to deeper water

I’ll fly, the shark thinks
through icy depths and
pinniped skin
Just farther, farther

Scars on the face
a jagged tail
War wounds from no enemy
but from the machine
that churns the water warmer
deeper
filtering through the gills
in clumps

The shark remembers
ancestors who used to rule
the ocean
leaving only mementos
of teeth the size of
dorsal fins
Who died just a couple
million years ago
A second in the blink
of the ocean’s tide
as it pushes and pulls

the great white shark to

deeper water