Maybe our bodies are the fish
and Jonah is what we carry inside.
The fish has taken us for a ride
so long we feel we’re only flesh.

The fish flees storms into the depths,
where it swims safe, a scaly ark,
and there sits Jonah in the dark,
playing cards and plotting escapes.

Garbled messages from beyond
seep through his cell: a rumored squall,
whale music cryptic as a call
to prophecy. But life on land

seems hard beside the ample, plush
apartments of the monster’s gut.
People, or so he hears, are not
as simple as solitaire: the crush

of company afflicts and salves.
Come out, Jonah. The good sinners
of Nineveh await—beginners,
like all of us, when it comes to our selves.