from a poster in buenos aires, artist unknown
Subtropic
by
Susan Tepper
If
you come to lie
under
his sheet,
sweat
soaked
night
a crumbling vein
blue-black
swells
along
the beach
in
sunken dreams
you
will find
ship
notes jammed
into
salt-scale bottles
waves
that beat a pier
half-leaning—
you
know this torture
rustling
your ears
that
sound
transparent
as glass
your
arms are rods
and
every fish
swam
these waters
trembling
as one
the
way light goes yellow,
wavers,
a storm
moving
down the coast—
foggy
you grip
with
your thighs
as
the water loosens
lunging
forward
on
someone’s command
~
first published in The Stony Thursday
Book
