I am a...

​I am an infant. I wriggle and roll and sleep, then repeat the cycle. Finally, I awake and register my surroundings.
 
I am an orphan, but I am not alone. I am jolted and goaded by siblings. Eventually, in a mad stampede, we coalesce and make a break for it. Though our stubby limbs are ill-suited to the task, we surge forward and run (or waddle) the gauntlet.
 
I am a victor. I have led the charge and survived the challenge. Many others were not so lucky. I plunge into the safety and escape of the sea.
 
I am a surfer. I ride the swells and eddies. I dance on the currents. I allow myself to drift away from the shore, the only home I’ve known.
 
I am an athlete. In spite of my ungainly appearance on land, I am full of grace and magic when I move through the water.
 
I am an explorer. I let the tides carry me where they will. I embrace the joy of the journey and revel in the experience.
 
I am an adult… at last. I feel a deep urge to nest- to start a family. Instinct tells me to go home and also tells me how to get there.
 
I am a connoisseur. My voyage opens new avenues, and I am attracted by shimmering opportunities. I lunge for a particularly enticing morsel. Snap! I have it. But I also have a sharp stinging pain as something tensile wraps itself around my limbs.
 
I am a sinking ship. My limbs grow ever weaker and more painful. The effort is monumental, but something drives me forward—or pulls me along. Finally, I spot the familiar shore and use my last reserves to haul out, exhausted, on to the sand.
 
I am a captive. Suddenly, I am grabbed, lifted, wrenched from my home, transported. The smells and sounds are so peculiar, unfamiliar, unwelcome.
 
I am a patient. ‘Damaged beyond repair’  ‘Must be amputated’. Lights, needles, tubes, sutures. Emerging from a strange sleep, I find that I have less pain and fewer limbs. 
 
I am a survivor. I learn to adapt to my new circumstances—within my body and without. My world shrinks down until I almost completely fill the remaining space.
 
I am an educator. They say that I am a victim and an ambassador. ‘Perils of plastic’  ‘Clean up our oceans’, they tell children or anyone who will listen. 
 
I am a prisoner, serving a life sentence for someone else’s crime. I am a sea turtle, but I will never see the sea again.


​19 June 2018