by Donna Vorreyer
Five dead frogs appear in the first mile
of my run, squashed flat and dried in the sun.
I don’t pretend to understand death
or resurrection, both beyond my reason,
but I hope they didn’t die in the dark.
I want to lasso the sun and drag it down
to my deathbed. A lament become
a lantern. Not the heat of the desert
but of dreaming, flushed and lusty. I taste
salt in my sleep, lick my lips. Unspell grief.
Unspell dying. Give me anagrams:
deifying. Edifying. Give me
those frogs, simple, gone. Give me this
long hot run, panting in the dying light.
DONNA VORREYER is the author of To Everything There Is (2020), Every Love Story is an Apocalypse Story (2016) and A House of Many Windows (2013), all from Sundress Publications. Her poems, reviews, and essays have appeared in Rhino, Tinderbox Poetry, Poet Lore, Sugar House Review, Waxwing, Whale Road Review, and many other journals, and she currently serves as an associate editor for Rhino Poetry. She has recently retired from 36 years in public education and can’t wait to see what happens next.
Featured Photo: “Lasso the Sun” by Alan Levine
Psaltery & Lyre 