We sit on the precipice of
Heaven and pollution; you hand
Me an empty box and promise
Desultory protection.
Our bodies, superimposed
From two different tangles of lake water
And thesaurus words didn’t match, didn’t
Hold hands, didn’t even look at the same
Edge of the mid-day.
Maybe I didn’t like you,
Just the clunk of your foot against
Wood and dock, the southeast tilt
Of your noise, the birds you drew
To us with the breadcrumbs you kept
Tucked in your pockets
for prosperity. Time ways, never
Did bring us any luck.
Just birds and algae, wrapped around
Each other, mocking the gap at our hips
Where attachment should be because even
Animals know when their egg must be laid.
We scared them off as quick as we drew
Them in, because they were smarter than me
And didn’t want to be a graphite impression
Soon to be shown to radio static.
Nature evading, I only had the water to look at
Because its lap was velvet
And its voice didn’t implode my ear canals
And one bird stayed; so small, so dark.
I’d never seen a more perfect crow,
Feathers gleaming like it’d been dipped in
Peacock ore, with a beak that is tarnished,
Broken against stagnant air.
I called and it didn’t fly away.
You used to be that nice to me,
We’d sit here with milk skin,
Library bound minds,
And the insurance of that empty space
between us. This sinkhole is your
Orlando, but this was never mine.
This box is mine. It’s the best that
I could ever get.
Anna Keeler is a poet and fiction writer living in Winter Park, FL. Her work has been published or is upcoming with Poets.org, Cleaver Magazine, Vending Machine Press, The Writing Disorder, The Yellow Chair Review, and more.
