Two New Horizons
the night Sarah Atthow sank between the reeds
to the bottom of the Quinsigamond River, i was
in a backyard with other silver spoon sons. laughing
like i understood the jokes, joking like i understood
the weather, knowing neither would ever matter.
so in the grandest but briefest of moments
that i cannot recall, the burning in her lungs
stopped for all but once and she noticed,
amidst the darkness of an indeterminable
amount of liquid force, her own left hand.
smiling at the weightless, leaf-like floating
ease of bending branches and digits.
through the grids of patterned houses with loud
problems and unquiet solutions. across 290, i looked
at how the moon broke like glass on the water’s surface.
and in the twist of the moon’s crease, somewhere atop
the silt, were her whispering lips and perfect posture.
but for all the thinking we would do on Sunday
morning about drivers, drinks and mischief,
Sarah Atthow was learning to take deep breaths
from the bottom of a new ocean — one whose
horizon extended past the weightless, leaf-like
floating ease of her own left hand.