Spooky Polypi at a Distance

Aside from malacologists

And logomaniacs, few folks

Know what malacologists know.

Oddly, given that hard k sound,

Malakos signified tender,

Soft, and gentle in Ancient Greek,

Rare exception, apparently,

To the bouba/kiki effect.

Anyway, squishy fish studies,

These days somewhat popularized

By lore of smart cephalopods.

The study of anything’s cool

If the subject borders magic—

Wormholes, entangled quantum states,

AI, octopus wizardry.

It’s not that people want to know

More intimately what’s under

Scrutiny so much as the thrill

Of any hints there are other

Timelines, other-minded agents,

Entwined weirdness in the framework

Of a householder’s universe.

It tends to end in puzzlement.

Which parts held that hint of magic—

The monstrous tentacles, the eyes

Of the near-alien agent,

Its behaviors, its spiral whorls?

People always seem to end up

Clutching emptied material.

At the Malacological

Museum, in the Makarska

Franciscan monastery’s shell,

The whole collection is just shells.