Treading Water
By: Zoe Davis
This well is deep and I have grown up
its stucco walls
neck stretched to sunlight
hands a dagger-leafed plant.
Lichen drips orison
from weathered sockets
toes curled
teasing a soft-mossed mouth.
I am a scream
a whimper
a nourishing source of hope
when I cannot crawl
I am
a sacrifice in brick
when pain eclipses joy
I sink
sleek beneath rich blanket folds
braid depths
tread water
until inevitability grips
my shoulders
stands
shakes eggs from nesting skull
the remains of me
mulch
sustaining
two nebbish ghosts.
The clank of the bucket.
The prayer of the painless.