Featured Poetry

Variations In The Shape Of Rain

Markus Spiske

It was suggested I take up new hobbies
so I started painting water—
the body politic of surrounding all processes
with a film of being: ovals of bulbed oil, panicked streaks,
long and patient licks, friction as a forever hold,
those little canyons shifting along the yard,
getting into everything like light, like grief, burrowing
into the place most willing to give—then I noticed
the missing items from the house:
a jar of sea glass, your first camera, and one day,
all the spoons, gone, and your mother’s watch
which was a wedding gift but you didn’t remember
that part. “I’ve been burying them
in the garden when it rains and the ground is more
forgiving, but I always place cuttings to fill the space,
so he’ll never notice,” you told someone
one morning while I was painting you leaning
against the window
and it was only us in the room.
It was your voice that never changed,
though most days I wish it would carve out
my name’s shape in the humid room
while knowing what the sound holds on to.
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