poetry by Allison Geller
june
the days are too hot, and too many, for argument.
she was met by a passing train
when she went to cross the tracks.
she hurried to the street corner,
so she could feel, for a second,
what it could mean to travel through time—
to be going, and going
two places at once.
he plants aromatics
in the expectation of her,
his hands driving the earth
in trust of all it contains.
july
the universe leaves its stain on his pillow,
under her head. Her sigh
is the day giving out, now the night
to still deeper night.
sleep always takes him first.
next to but not near,
she wills her eyes open,
hopes to cause his sleeping form pain.
the heat has taken its duty to heart.
she doubts her own honesty,
and he loves her more.
august
dim and damp,
the moment is always between storms,
impossible to tell if one has passed
or is coming.
he uproots his herbs
and lets the dry soil run through his fingertips,
smelling of depth and something known so much
it’s forgotten,
while she waits for her time to make the best of things—
the rumble, a whistle.
