I strapped a tank to my back
and dropped backwards
off the side of Andy’s
wooden lobster boat, Dovekey.

I hung in the icy murk for an hour,
overturning rocks
rolling sea cucumbers
bothering lobsters.

Before my air ran out
she floated into view
wide eyed and calm like an old black Lab.

Seeing a seal underwater
was what I’d wanted
though I hadn’t known this.

Ghostly slow she mooned at me,
not swimming off. I got closer,
ready for her to jet away,
but she stayed.
I was thinking:
someone needs to see this.
I got nearer and nearer
until I touched her—
my neoprene mitts on her velvet skin.
I hugged that seal.
She just stared at me
with those unblinking eyes
still expecting me not to believe
she was real.

Lewis Robinson is the author of the novel WATER DOGS and the story
collection OFFICER FRIENDLY. He lives in Portland, Maine and this is the
first year since 2003 that he hasn’t coached basketball; instead, he is
working on his own jump shot.