© Rock Salt Plum, 2003-2007. All Rights Reserved. Copying, digital retrieval, or transfer in any form (other than for personal reading or viewing), is strictly prohibited unless authorized.
I give her salt on her tongue, tequila
all the way down to her toes, ice between
her teeth, crushed like sugar rocks.
This rocky state has something to hide
from us after twilight. Cabochon
birds settle under rabbitbrush.
Gemstone peaks turn rough
and dull before the morning
facets them again.
For now the only
chatoyancy left is an island
of aspens by the trail, where
together we pick up a bleeding
Spotted Sandpiper.
From under its wing I tweeze a fish
hook. She quickly dabs the wound
with a fingertip of alcohol before
the orange-billed feather storm in our hands
flips and forces us to let go,
to watch it in our stupors
take bow-winged fluttery flight
over the cinder-strewn slopes
we've come so far to appraise.
Powers is a PhD candidate in the creative writing program at the University of
Wisconsin Milwaukee. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Shenandoah,
Main Street Rag, Margie, and Poetry Southeast. He teaches English at Marian
College of Fond du Lac, and spends most of his free time at Dollywood.
But thou, O daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.
- Daniel (ch. XII, v. 4)
