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WATER IS A LONG, OLD STORY . . .
One that, like all the best stories, keeps repeating, returning, persisting.
In service to that story, we're taking this week to share a poem recently published in the spring issue of Crab Creek Review. You can find it, along with a companion poem, and many more from other contributors, when you pick up a copy.
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Reliquary for the River
Glaciers carved my mother’s body from the earth. All along
she was a sculptor, fingers pulling excess flour
from newsprint, two by two, the smell of it,
wide strips growing thicker with satisfying
soaked readiness, and the balloon disappearing
beneath new skin. Freedom: the thing
that loved me while I was spun in circles
until there was nothing left to crush. Imagine
water and time are the same thing: let’s gather up
all we have, let it run through our hands
until we are full of gratitude again, able to love
any amount of swallow-danced nothing. False
teeth in the dentist’s treasure box.
Black licorice in the piñata. Imagine
there was no time, only place: where we were
when sun met water, where we were when
many people died, murmuring places holding memory
like stars in the river were pearls, my mouth
always full with slick, chewy words that shine
no matter how long they’ve been in the dirt. Time is
the most painful of all the hungers
because it is never satisfied. My body is
the landscape of history’s appetite for me. My past
a small girl playing in the river
that flows through the bend in my knee. The river is
my mother’s body. My mother the woman in me.
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This poetic interlude is in service to a rare week when Taylor is traveling, and in celebration of the upcoming publication of my first book of poetry in 2026. If you're inspired to keep up with a different part of my writing life, you can sign up to hear from me (sporadically and infrequently) when I publish new work.
To the water in all of us,
Dor
original collage by Estefania Trujillo Preciado, incorporating artwork by Cristóbal Schmal
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