{"id":3792,"date":"2025-05-02T21:37:39","date_gmt":"2025-05-02T21:37:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/?page_id=3792"},"modified":"2025-05-02T21:37:39","modified_gmt":"2025-05-02T21:37:39","slug":"aqua-incognita-by-sam-moe","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/aqua-incognita-by-sam-moe\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cAqua Incognita\u201d by Sam Moe"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Marianna Trench is the deepest part of the ocean. I tell my students this and encourage them to write about their own trenches, or what I like to call \u201cpits.\u201d I explain to them that a pit might be where trauma lives. It is a void where one can get stuck when working on their creative nonfiction. Sometimes my pit has lights hanging in it. Other times, it is filled with water, darkness, and a television hanging from an invisible cord, replaying images I can recall from the side, as if I am glancing from the corner of my eye. I tell my students to focus on describing their pits, trenches, gashes. The place in their lives they are afraid to traverse, but they might consider examining with caution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When I go home that night, I don\u2019t examine my own pit. In the bathroom, I use soap on the gash on my arm. I am tired, I am tired, my god, there is no other way to tell this story. I am so fucking tired of hurting myself.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Throughout the week, I reread old essays and poems. I try to coax myself back into the writing space. I learn I\u2019ve tried to stop many times throughout the years. There are lines about me entering the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth year. I reread old journals, realize I\u2019ve been miscalculating when I started, that this is year twenty and if I don\u2019t stop now, I may reach the point of no return. Twice in one week I try to take my own life. It was in February of this year. I resolve to tell no one, then I try to tell two of best friends, and fail. Speech and clarity become difficult.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Something happened and I might not have been here afterwards, <\/em>I say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Thank you for telling us,<\/em> they respond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They are not disingenuous. And I do not feel grateful. I am scared and stuck. I am peeling my scabs and drinking too much caffeine and having nightmares. I lay awake in the bed and stare at the pit that is my bathroom, beyond which is a closet.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"2\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When we first moved to this apartment, I had to sleep with the lights on. My partner was still in Illinois, working and cleaning, packing our life up. He asks me how the new place is. I tell him it is scary. The rooms are too big and there isn\u2019t any furniture. I sleep on the bedroom floor, feeling like a child again. While reading horror novels and working on a project about Bluebeard, I start imagining my closet has turned into his secret room. Every day, sometimes several times a day, I yank the door open to make sure there aren\u2019t corpses hanging from the ceiling, women turned into plants and pots, their organs stuffed in urns. The closet is empty; I close the door and turn around as quickly as possible, convinced someone, or something, is behind me.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The bedroom is filled with early morning light. It\u2019s almost July, one of the hottest months in Alabama, and the sky is bright aqua, like a highlighter.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>What if a monster comes to eat me? <\/em>I ask my partner. We talk on the phone nightly, me in the center of the living room, daring someone to walk through the front door, and he alone with all the lights off, his face illuminated by three computer monitors. He laughs hysterically before responding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>No, that won\u2019t happen<\/em>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\u2019m grateful he doesn\u2019t call me a child.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"3\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Despite the extreme pressure, creatures survive in the Mariana Trench. After digging around on the internet for oceanic facts, I learn food can trickle down from the surface, providing nutrients. Several of the sea creatures are bioluminescent. I watch YouTube videos of sea devils and angler fish, wondering what the white particles are which float around their heads.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During EMDR sessions, my brain enters the pit, which takes on the form of an enormous waiting room. The room is pitch black, like The Void in Stranger things where Millie Bobby Brown\u2019s character, Eleven, enters when forced to spy, or when trying to find her friends. Where Eleven screams in the void, her physical body mutters in another reality, floating in a saltwater pool in the hands of Winona Ryder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My void space is similar. Sometimes, the floor is flooded. I usually enter as an adult. It is where my mind travels when my therapist first says, <em>Let\u2019s go in<\/em>. Meaning, go into the dream space, where my dissociated memories live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At first, I am stuck in the void. I must coax myself into my memories by building doors in my mind. The doors are red, navy blue, forest green, and most recently, yellow. They all bring me to different locations in my memory. Green is for New York City. Red is for my father\u2019s house, blue is for my childhood home, and yellow seems to bring me to any of my mother\u2019s rooms across multiple states and decades.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I am afraid to enter through the yellow door. In my mind, I see my child-self. She is around the age of six or seven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Did we stop hurting ourselves? <\/em>I imagine her asking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>No, <\/em>my adult-self responds. <em>But we still need to go through the door.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Upon first entering, I see my mother\u2019s bedroom in Massachusetts. The walls are the color of cream. My father is in the bed. I am rubbing his feet. Our bodies mutate and move, returning to a house I used to live in when I was a kid. We are in Franklin, Massachusetts. He is laying on the couch with a bathrobe sash tied around his head for his migraine. I am sitting next to him, still six or seven. My therapist pauses the EMDR buzzers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Tell me what you see.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>My father and I are on the couch<\/em>, I explain, offering her the rest of the memory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Is this the first time you remember this?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Yes<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>And do you believe this one?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>For some reason right now, I have no doubt.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Before I leave the session, she stops me in the doorway. She is a foot shorter than I am and wearing a frilled blue top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Remember, the worst things in your life have already happened.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Okay,<\/em> I reply before stepping into the warm day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"4\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the day, my flashbacks worsen. I can\u2019t access them for long. They take a few seconds or less, and their images are confusing. Afterwards, I feel terror. The feeling dissipates and I try to move on with my day. My colleague\/friend tells me to leave my anxiety at the door. I attempt to do so by journaling in the parking lot, trying to get out all my fears and trauma before I must teach that day. Sometimes the exercise works. I close the journal and walk away from the car; I am grateful to be leaving memories of my family behind for the next ten hours. Sometimes, creative nonfiction calls back these memories. I try not to think about the void, the trench, my gash. I continue to research the ocean, attempting to mask while in a glass meeting room with my colleagues and friends, nicknamed \u201cthe fishbowl.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>You look like an art display,<\/em> one of my friends says. He is referring to my desk-sized notebook I\u2019ve been writing my EMDR memories in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>You should close the door and invite people to watch me journal,<\/em> I joke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>They would love that. You could start crying.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><\/em>I am so hilarious until I\u2019m not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"5\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the weekend, we host a conference with the English department. I arrive at school so early in the morning I find half the hallways are pitch black because the stop motion lights have turned off, and the rest of the school is filled with sparkling sunshine. It is a crisp Spring morning in February and there are barely any clouds in the sky. I take pictures of the half-lit halls. I think about horror films, and how this is a common trope: chiaroscuro. There is nothing lurking down the hallways of school, no monsters or creatures, cousins or mothers. But I feel the dread creeping in on me. It is centipede-like in shape and hungry.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Hadal Zone, named after the Greek god Hades, is built out of oceanic trenches. Upon sifting deeper into my ocean research, I find out ocean trenches are also called <em>depressions<\/em> in the ocean and are the deepest locations. Upon first moving to the apartment, I was reading Julia Armfield\u2019s <em>Our Wives Under the Sea<\/em> and thinking about how the ocean was a good space for a haunting. I realize now these were my brain\u2019s early tugs towards the deep gash in my memory.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In <em>Our Wives Under the Sea<\/em>, two women are trying to make their way back to each other after one of them has been trapped in a submarine expedition for months. The wife from the sea, Leah, becomes obsessed with water. Her body slowly transforms alongside her obsession, turning cold and wet to the touch. Miri doesn\u2019t know how to support her. She spends hours a day trying to contact the submarine company, to no avail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My partner tries to support me throughout EMDR. At first, when I tell him what I find out about my father, he is skeptical. He tells me he hopes it isn\u2019t true. I don\u2019t know how to respond to this. As the weeks go on, memories become sharper. I knew I was raised in a violent household, but these \u2019discoveries\u2019 make me feel worse. I stop calling my mother, only sending her the occasional text. My therapist suggests she knew and asks why I am always protecting her in conversation. I don\u2019t realize I am doing this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>My therapist said I am protecting my abusers, <\/em>I tell my partner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>You always do that, <\/em>he responds. <em>It\u2019s like you love them or something.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We spend the week talking about the cycle of abuse. My partner asks me if <em>he<\/em> is abusive. I still don\u2019t know how to answer that question. I\u2019m uncertain how much space he should take up in this essay. Whenever things become pressurized between the two of us, my body contorts. I am reminded of sea life, frilled and delicate, thousands of feet below the surface of the ocean. Above, there is sun and seagulls. There are storms and harbors. Beneath, there are creatures whose fins and mouths glow. They contain lures which beckon prey into their mouths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Do you think my mother was a lure? <\/em>I ask my therapist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>That\u2019s something we\u2019ve got to figure out<\/em>, she responds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"6\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In creative nonfiction, I ask my students to draw blueprints of their childhood homes. It is an exercise I learned from Joy Castro during a creative writing workshop I took with her the year prior. The instructions are as follows: take a piece of paper\u2014the largest you can find\u2014and draw a blueprint of whichever childhood home stands out to you the most. After drawing the blueprint, you\u2019ll need to add details\u2014as many details as you can possibly fit onto the page. Finally, writers must circle the \u201cemotional hotspot\u201d of the house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One of my friends tells me I should focus on the cold spot of the house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>What if they don\u2019t want to write about their trauma? <\/em>he asks me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Good point<\/em>, I reply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I encourage the students to also talk about the <em>cold areas<\/em> of the house, either because of hauntings, ghosts, a room that was off-limits, or any other interpretation they may have. Several students circle both the cold and the hot spots. Some houses contain multiple cold spots. I want to ask the students what stories these areas tell, but I try not to pry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The last part of the instructions is to write from that space, either cold or hot, embodying all the details and senses necessary to tell the story.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"7\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Identifying the hot and cold rooms in each of the places I\u2019ve lived has been difficult. Many of the rooms I\u2019ve slept in are a combination of the two, leading me to believe there are both ghosts and sustained memories of sustained trauma smeared around the room, like grease. In EMDR sessions, the place with the hottest rooms I continue returning to is my father\u2019s childhood home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He inherited the house from his own parents after they died of lung cancer in the early 2000s. I don\u2019t remember anything about my father\u2019s side of the family, other than that they no longer speak to us. His family immigrated from Ireland. They sided with him in the divorce. My grandparents both had tempers. The kitchen is always muggy, with a sticky floor and plastic countertops. I continue to remember him angry in the kitchen. Both of my stepmothers used to storm in and out, screaming at anyone who got in their path. When I recall the kitchen in therapy sessions, I always see an amorphous blob on the floor. She is a tangled mass of hair and blood. She is built mostly you of shadow. Sometimes I think she is me. Other times, she is my mother or my sister.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Creatures surviving in hadal trenches eat spilled chemicals from volcanoes, rotten corpses, and debris. I wonder how often these corpses sink into their respective pits. How long does it take the marine life between meals? Do they starve? Do they ever eat sunken wood? And how did I survive starvation when I was younger?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"8\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I have different theories about myself. I believe I developed hypothyroidism from malnutrition. This is in fact a potential cause. My primary care doctor asks if I remember eating when I was younger. My sister recalls constant hunger. A pit for a stomach. I stole food, clothes, shoes, and makeup from my friends and from strangers. When I was able to eat, I binged. Life still flourishes in the trench, but it looks different. Am I different? Am I able to flourish?<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"9\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My mother\u2019s childhood bedroom was called \u201cthe blue room\u201d because of the bright blue walls she painted when she was a teenager. I often confuse her room and my aunt\u2019s room next-door, called \u201cthe pink room.\u201d During the day, the blue room contained stale cerulean light, filtering through a single window. Each of the bedrooms in her apartment, located on the upper West Side of Manhattan, has at least two doors. Some have three. My mother\u2019s old room has two French doors with a lock on the outside, a door to the hallway with a lock on the inside, and an inner door with no lock, coated in so many layers of paint we have to jam our hips into the door to get it open. The door is now blocked on both sides, by my mother\u2019s stacks of books and my cousin\u2019s dehumidifier.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the processing dreams, I recall hiding under a table in the blue room. In this scenario, I was the monster. My two younger cousins and my sister liked to play shipwreck. They destroyed the living room and used the connecting rooms to create blanket and pillow forts. I don\u2019t remember what kind of monster I was. As they walked slowly down the ribbon of green hallway, I heard the first door open. The trio walked through, nervous and giggling. I waited until they thought they were safe before crawling after my youngest cousin and grabbing him by the leg as he crossed the threshold into the next space; he immediately gave up, screaming with laughter while hitting me in the face with a nearby pillow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"10\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On the headboard of one of the twin beds in the pink room used to be a sticker of a black-and-white octopus advertising a mattress service. When I was thirteen, my period became so bad I was having dozens of blood clots. I menstruated for almost three weeks. I can\u2019t remember when we went to the hospital. Perhaps it was after I bled through the mattress. I stopped being able to walk from blood loss. I always wonder what happened to that mattress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"11\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Several days after the conference I begin physical therapy for my pelvic floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the first session, one of my doctors puts on a pair of teal gloves before inspecting the walls of my vagina. She presses gently and asks if it hurts. I tell her yes. The pain varies, from moderate to severe. She asks if my partner will stop if I tell him to during intercourse.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>We might break up and sometimes he throws things or hits things\u2014or he hits himself. We argue and he\u2019s in love with my childhood best friend and he thinks I\u2019m gay. But yes, he would stop if I told him to.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><\/em>She doesn\u2019t look at me, instead writing notes on a piece of paper.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>It\u2019s no wonder why you think you might be gay; you\u2019ve had horrible encounters with men.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><\/em>I don\u2019t know how to respond. When filling out the intake forms, I hesitated to out myself. Part of me feels she meant nothing by the comment. The other part of me is overflowing with fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Telling my friends I think I am gay has a similar response. Every time I\u2019ve tried to come out, it\u2019s either been an argument or a negotiation. <em>But you have a cis\/het male partner, you\u2019ve had intercourse with men, you\u2019ve said you had crushes on men. <\/em>What I want to explain is, I\u2019ve adapted to men. My parents were violent growing up. Several times I ran away from home. After my sister came out as queer and trans, my mother threw out her medication. I don\u2019t want to tell my family. I don\u2019t know how to tell my friends.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Something I\u2019ve come to realize recently is I fawn, especially around men. If anything, it becomes worse when men are involved. I have tried to mimic heteronormativity when living in dangerous situations (physically and emotionally violent.) I have tried to leave time and again. At long last, I am finally successful. But still, I am in a relationship with a man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I tell my friends we are ending things. They ask me if I\u2019ll date another man. At first, I say yes. The more time goes on, I realize this is something I feel obligated to do. I cannot count how many men have raped me. I cannot count how many times I have been raped or assaulted. The number surpasses logic. Even one surpasses logic. The abuse was illogical. When I went home over winter break and was assaulted again, my brain became obsessive and illogical with hurting myself. I focused more on blood and gauze than I did my own writing or healing. Now when people ask me if I\u2019ll date another man afterwards, I only laugh in response. How am I going to tell them I\u2019ve uncovered CSA through my therapy sessions? How to explain the constant hyper-vigilance, the suicide attempts, the nonstop fear? This is how I have survived under pressure; my contorting my body until I no longer recognize it. If given the option, I would be a carnivorous fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"12\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Images of the Mariana Trench show a deep pit extending far into the earth. On my computer screen, the area looks no thicker than a needle. Just above the area is what is referred to as the Midnight Zone, another area of darkness and pressure. There are some bioluminescent fish and predators which hunt them. One such creature is the gulper eel, also referred to as a pelican eel. The creature can expand its jaw, which looks more like the opening of a large clam. It\u2019s mouth essentially acts as a net which allows it to swallow prey. When its mouth opens, it becomes inflated, like a black balloon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One of my pelvic floor therapists tells me I am tense on the right side of my body. She is massaging behind my ears, tugging at my earlobes. The right side of my body is tightly wound, like a coil. We spend several weeks working on the muscles from my jaw to my shoulders to my thighs. I wonder why only half my body is so tight; she tells me this is normal. We have conversations about how I need to practice these exercises at home to loosen my muscles and relieve some of my chronic pain. When she asks me if I had trauma in my jaw, I explain to her this was related to the years of abuse I experienced in high school.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When I was seventeen, my boyfriend at the time went on vacation over the summer. I wasted time at a friend\u2019s house down the street, hanging out with several men older than me who chain smoked and built massive bonfires in their father\u2019s backyard. We only hung out at night, in a gazebo covered in an old mosquito net. I don\u2019t remember where anyone\u2019s parents were, where some of my friends had gone. There was a girl there\u2014did she see what happened? Did anyone count how many times? Eight hands, which later turned into ten. These are not the only hands. This is a brief history of my body in pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Upon returning from vacation, his friends told him I cheated. When he asked me what happened, I sobbed in his arms in a field at dusk. Everything was pitch black except a puddle of silver from a single streetlamp. He told me nothing I said made sense, that I was in control the whole time. For the next year, he took part. No one stopped, asked me if I was okay. No one listened when I said no. I went to school with my body covered in bandages, a pocket full of gauze and a sewing kit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During the day, I sleep-walked. Others told me I was a terrible person before dragging me into empty classrooms and back stairwells. The man I was dating, twice my age, picked me up in the middle of the night. He took me to different dimly lit houses, smoked crack before eating me out in the back of the car. My body was a useless puppet. He asked if I came. I lied and said yes and stared at the moon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Whenever I tell these stories, people are horrified. I\u2019m sure I appreciate their reactions, but I am also mortified at being seen. Some people say they want to kill the men. Others tell me they are grateful to be able to understand better. After these interactions, I think, <em>they will finally understand; they will stop being upset when I say sorry. They will be patient. <\/em>I worry I am asking for too much. Loving me is work enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I wonder if the angler fish can experience pain. It exists with its jaw constantly open, the inside of its stomach vulnerable. Yet the anglerfish is a predator. There are so many hungry creatures in the deepest parts of the ocean, whose mouths are constantly open to collect and feed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My partner and I are slowly separating. Each night, he goes to bed earlier and earlier. I gather my belongings and put them in the bedroom, journaling until I fall asleep. At school, I am exhausted. My friends\/colleagues are supportive. They tell me it\u2019s okay if I cry in front of them and encourage me to let my guard down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u00a0I\u2019ve been writing essays for years now. But I\u2019ve never realized perhaps an ending should leave the reader with a strong emotion. Past editors have asked me to revise my essays to account for healing. I wasn\u2019t, at the time, and lied, creating false narratives in exchange for publication. When my friends appear worried, I pretend I am going to be fine. I allow my therapists to help me in my healing journey. I paint beds and hands and teeth. And in the evening, I write by the blue light of my computer, in the hopes that a stranger will come across my writing in their corner of the internet and feel nourished. At the very least, I hope they feel less alone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:100px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" \/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Sam Moe<\/strong> is the author of six books of poetry. Her most recent collection, <em>RED HALCYON<\/em>, is forthcoming from Querencia Press in 2026. Her debut short story collection, <em>I MIGHT TRUST YOU<\/em>, is forthcoming from Experiments in Fiction in Spring 2025. She has attended the Sewanee Writers\u2019 Conference and received fellowships from the Longleaf Writer\u2019s conference and the Key West Literary Seminar. Sam has also received writing residencies from The Writers\u2019 Colony at Dairy Hollow and Ch\u00e2teau d\u2019Orquevau. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Marianna Trench is the deepest part of the ocean. I tell my students this and encourage them to write about their own trenches, or what I like to call \u201cpits.\u201d I explain to them that a pit might be where trauma lives. It is a void where one can get stuck when working on &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/aqua-incognita-by-sam-moe\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;\u201cAqua Incognita\u201d by Sam Moe&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2310,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-3792","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2310"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3792\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/oxmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}