At the exact moment where night becomes day, there’s a meet-cute between heat & atmosphere that only takes place in certain places; not in L.A. or the Florida Keys, where white-sand minutes tick strictly forward, but along plainland rivers where crickets & frogs take turns directing an orchestra of timber rattlesnakes & cormorants singing backwards, their wings spread against stars, sweeping shadows into daylight. We went at dawn down into the fog-thick valley, just to listen, our feet dangling from a sycamore log stretched graciously across the shallow inlet, blue indigo & purple loosestrife shining in the almost-morning. I promise, we’ll remember this forever, the way today held out so long, our feet red with gravel, dipped in the river, cleansed by moss-thick stones & morning’s first glimmer.
Kate Wylie (she/they) is a poet from St. Louis, Missouri. An MFA candidate at Pacific University and 2018 Webster University alum, Wylie reads fiction for The New Southern Fugitives and is a regular contributor to the Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome society magazine Loose Connections.
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