A Display of Mackerel
--Mark Doty 

They lie in parallel rows,
on ice, head to tail,
each a foot of luminosity 

barred with black bands,
which divide the scales'
radiant sections 

like seams of lead
in a Tiffany window.
Iridescent, watery 

prismatics: think abalone,
the wildly rainbowed
mirror of a soapbubble sphere, 

think sun on gasoline.
Splendor, and splendor,
and not a one in any way 

distinguished from the other
--nothing about them
of individuality. Instead 

they're all exact expressions
of one soul,
each a perfect fulfillment 

of heaven's template,
mackerel essence. As if,
after a lifetime arriving 

at this enameling, the jeweler's
made uncountable examples,
each as intricate 

in its oily fabulation
as the one before.
Suppose we could iridesce, 

like these, and lose ourselves
entirely in the universe
of shimmer--would you want 

to be yourself only,
unduplicatable, doomed
to be lost? They'd prefer, 

plainly, to be flashing participants,
multitudinous. Even now
they seem to be bolting 

forward, heedless of stasis.
They don't care they're dead
and nearly frozen, 

just as, presumably,
they didn't care that they were living:
all, all for all, 

the rainbowed school
and its acres of brilliant classrooms,
in which no verb is singular, 

or every one is. How happy they seem,
even on ice, to be together, selfless,
which is the price of gleaming.