Cats clung to the shelves and hung from the ivy.
Loam soaked into my pores, crusted my skin.
Groaning in the damp sheets, I woke having forgotten who I was.
Bats swept the sky, hummingbirds drank from the water hose.
Clay girl, I pulled myself up the rope knot by knot.
Spiders slept hanging above me; slugs mated on the bed frame.
Adders swayed to the earth’s hum, a sound I felt in my bones.
Jays fought on the plastic’s other side, millimeters away, all outside
creaking on its rusty hinges. Spiders hatched in my sheets,
ran countless hundreds, eyelash-tiny, across my pillow.
Fan motors melted in the heat, the microwave too.
Shrieking owls swooped inches above my head.
Dirt daubers drew me from myself. Night tunneled in, breathed my name.
Flirting with madness, I heard everything, everything, call out
and I answered.
Photo By: Alyson Hurt
