Undersea Choir – Kim Roger Abi Zeid Daou

I’ve always felt safe in water. In that I
always trusted the waves to cradle me.
My father to collect seashells
& stories nearby to surprise me.
Safe to explore, attachment systems are
internal working models, experiential.
Sea makes a home in my mind, salt in my ears.
Fish fins to limbs, limbs to fish fins.
The enormousness of blue
Cannot scare me, blue the color of my veins,
Little veins my father kissed, when we played wrists.
My ocean is warm & of yellow hues.
My ocean tastes of sun.
My ocean is my oscillating from limbs to fish fins,
Fish fins to limbs.
Senses ballooning into song,
My sister and I, undersea choir.
I do not know of attachment wounds.
Attachment systems experiential,
You cannot think your way into loving and love.
I’ve always felt safe in water. But I avoid lakes.
Fresh water cannot dimple my skin the same.
A lake is warmer than air, yes,
But I cannot sit with its unfamiliar lack.
I believe waterlilies and hydrilla count,
But a certain kind of warmth is experiential,
& seeing the sun, perceiving the sun,
& feeling its warmth is not the same. Remember
My ocean tastes of sun, and you
Look at the sun and see a hole in the sky.

Kim Roger Abi Zeid Daou is a storyteller, artist, and PhD candidate at McGill University. At the heart of her stories is an exploration of perceptual biases, neuroscience, and the dynamic and poetic ways in which we create and conceptualize narratives and experiences.