Читать книгу Habitation of Wonder - Abigail Carroll - Страница 14

Haunt of salp and red-shelled crab—here lives the mouthless, sac-bodied

tubeworm: white finger tentacled to vents and cold seeps, feeding

on water and sulfur and dark. Kingdom of the lungless,

the gill-raked, the swim-bladdered: the eel-like hagfish,

scavenger of whale falls; the “snot-flower” bone-eater, feather-plumed

burrower. Behold: the gulper, the swallower, all manner of loosejaw,

the wide-gaped, blunt-snouted citizens of the deep— dragon-faced

fangtooths hanging in the blackness, hinge-skulled viperfish

barbel-luring hermit crabs. Consider also the bulb-eyed jewel squid,

hovering umbrella under-studded with stars, and the silver-

scaled eye-ring of the star-washed lanternfish, thin-finned, dazzle-tailed firefly

of the brine. This is the province of the spike-eyed and light-averse,

canyon-dwellers, night-dwellers, breathers of cold and salt. This is the empire

of the armor-shelled and carapaced, the saw-tooth clawed, the tendril-danglers,

the glowers, the snappers, the mute.