by Julie Ann
Eleven years old and it will not die
it keeps growing
and I am the ugly part of it
some days and we
has found that ugly can come tumbling down,
a dirt clod shaken loose from
Oklahoma roots can become a small
avalanche and afterwards you can’t breathe
and it’s a real mess to clean up but
we can do it
because this we is another kind of consciousness
altogether now
and it is like a three-legged human race
(and where is we going
is the question to keep asking, and loving
the question and vanished lightning
bug answer is what to do besides just go),
so go with it, because the tie
that binds the middle leg will chafe
but then one day caress like satin
lazily tossed in a breeze
touching tender as feathers
(not sharp quills piercing skin,
but our other’s grown feathers)
then winding around under
the old sunshine nurturing
a tree or two, a flower or two
and you will know you are moving with angels
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Julie Ann lives in Oxford, Mississippi where she teaches English and edits a poetry journal called The Guidebook. Born in Independence, Missouri, she studied psychology at Elizabethtown College and Auburn University. Her writing has been selected to appear recently in Amaranthine Muses, Caper Literary Journal, The Potomac, and Country Dog Review. She is mostly left-handed. |
WILLOWS WEPT REVIEW 