CRADLE ME, LONG NIGHT

Some of the spell is broken when the light comes back.

                                                                        Winter has held us

                                    close to death. Its slow melt

                                                            still rattles

the stilts we stand on.              Soon, water

      will sink our driveway and the steps leading to our front door.

            The rocks I sweep                   off the porch

will fall through water

                                                                                    to bone

                                    crushing small mammals

under their heft.

                  When the bodies reemerge, you

                                                will wring them out, leave

their small, soaked shapes on my pillow.       Already, the bed tastes

                                    damp.

            The light scatters

long shadows all over the sheets. Something drips

      from the mattress to the floor.

                                                            I talk to myself beneath

my breath.            

                        Remember, there is darkness

                                                                               at the other end of the year. Until then

I close my eyes while you

                        become stone.

---

K Janeschek is a writer and labor organizer originally from the Midwest. Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Mid-American Review, Foglifter, Nimrod International Journal, HAD, Variant Lit, Split Rock Review, Poet Lore, and elsewhere, and has won an AWP Intro Journals Project award in poetry. They live in Alaska.