Little Skate at Ballston Beach

Shark-like, but no shark. This skate's dead or dying.
Wings cut away by a fillet knife
cartilaginous body washed ashore
slender tail with tiny teethlike points,
dermal denticles.

o   cousin of rays and sharks
o    condrich thyes _.
o   skeleton not of bone but cartilage
Thing of jaws, paired fins, paired nostrils-

Who scooped you from the ocean floor,
tore you from gravel saltwater's bottom?
Your wings excised, eye closed
though my finger pokes at it and you gaze as if
confused as to what brought you to this beach.

I dined on skate wing once in a Paris brasserie
the raie fanned out on the plate
tender under the buttery crust.
Capers swam in the juices.
The meat tasted sweet, like Chesapeake crab.

Your gray form on the sand,
spiky tail inform me:
I could never make a meal of skate again
remembering you
brave wingless thing.