Shark Eyes

Cold, dead and beautifully
blue as the depths
of the ocean,
sharks have sinister eyes
almost as sharp
as their teeth
in shady underwater.

Sharks sleep
with their eyes wide open.
Sharks have no soul;
seeing only in monochrome,
there is no colour in their lives,
not even red
in the blood they shed.

Kim M. Russell, 15th July 2025

Image by Steve Douglas on Unsplash.

It’s Tuesday and, at the dVerse Poets Pub, time for Poetics, this week with Melissa who would like us to write about sharks.

Melissa tells us that we are about a week away from Shark Week, which was established in 1987 to educate the public and raise interest in sharks. She has shared an excerpt from a poem called ‘About the Teeth of Sharks’ by John Ciardi, which is so good I’ve resisted writing about them and written a kind of sonnet about their eyes instead. I admit, I’m terrified of sharks, although I will probably never come across one in real life.

28 thoughts on “Shark Eyes”

  3. Give homo sapiens another 396 million years to catch up with shark evolution, and we’ll be throwing sharkskin nukes, all cool and monochromy. Why do guys dream like sharks see blood?

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    2. I just read Nolcha’s comment, which says that sharks have an important role in the ocean, weeding out the ill and weak, thus keeping underwater species strong.

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      1. Really? My pea-sized thinker tells me there are other fish to take care of that. But sharks have a palate for humans. The others? Never heard of their tastes 🤷🏽‍♀️. But that’s just me. I’m sure Nolcha knows better. 🤣 Thanks Kim. Thanks Nolcha. Wonderful you guys.

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  9. You chose the perfect unsplash image to accompany this shark-y poem. Well done!!!! Shark attacks have increased as our oceans have warmed .. terrifying.

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