how to breathe

i am sorry. i can only tell you
what i've done to breathe.
this will not work for everyone. 
i knit gills from the stray threads
of my mother's knitting.
one follicle at a time. blue & purple
& speckled brown. all the while
trying to fill my lungs with coins.
what will you take with you
when you turn back to the water?
this is how i think of memory:
the fish in me that craves the deepest
depth the ocean can offer. cave or chasm
or trench. there, trading in our eyes
for prophecies, i will rest. i have always been
hungry for what i cannot breathe.
give me ghost knots & smoke. give me
the piano wire hair of angels. 
i could never understand why
everyone else was alive on the playground
& i was so dead. i'd walk down 
to the creek where there floated 
all the bodies of not-girls. i would
talk to them & they would tell me
all i needed was water. cattails & tall grass.
the gills now like a pleated skirt
which i wear to hear everyone talking.
tell me, what organs have you made
to stay alive? i have one single wing,
a third eye, & the gills. the other children
with their big lungs full of gnats.
they don't even know how loud
their throats are. we know though.
we hear every breath. the snakes in the grass
tell me, "do not dream of being like them."
i lie & tell the snakes, "i don't."
of course i do. who doesn't want
to inhale & have the whole world 
bent to our tongue? that has never been
what i've known. though, lately,
my teeth have been piano keys. 
i invite the minnows to come & play.