Dear Koi Fish Tattoo

your eyes look too young for you

as though the world 

has aged you in all places but there,

where you hide some part of yourself.

(i wonder who we would all be without our trauma)

but your laugh is surprising--

as was your Name

which I have barely spoken

above a whisper to myself.

(some old world superstition)

i admit i am not a praying man

but your shoulders strike up a choir

i feel as though you are a shrine in a temple

which i should pay respects to on my knees. 

Yours,

St. Matthew