Inscription
A portrait of dawn hung in the sky.
The seagull-calls became my blush –
bruises like plumage. Then I renamed you:
the growth of pampas grass among the dunes.
The dunes took the shape of your mourning.
I could no longer hear their movements,
nor was the wind persuaded
to carry our voices. The heavy ocean,
doubled in its mirror, turned our memories into sand –
rewrote them all in its silver words. At night,
we touched the clams, asked some of them to open.
A portrait of dawn hung in the sky.
The seagull-calls became my blush –
bruises like plumage. Then I renamed you:
the growth of pampas grass among the dunes.
The dunes took the shape of your mourning.
I could no longer hear their movements,
nor was the wind persuaded
to carry our voices. The heavy ocean,
doubled in its mirror, turned our memories into sand –
rewrote them all in its silver words. At night,
we touched the clams, asked some of them to open.
Kimberly Kralowec holds a degree in English from Pomona College in Claremont, California, where she received the F.S. Jennings Memorial Writing Prize. Her work has previously appeared in Poetry Midwest, and her chapbook manuscript, Currence, is seeking a publisher. She lives in San Francisco, where she works as a lawyer and writes the blog anapoetics.com.
Art: Claire Tang