Unbound
Susan Butler
I am the sorceress—
my spells are bees on blossoms
the day I leave him in the ground and keep walking.
I am the mermaid—
my eyes contain the deaths of stars
the day I give up singing to empty echoes and begin to drown.
Ebony crickets thrum at the edge of a still blue evening, sleep, and tomorrow,
barefoot, we gather blackberries in lemon-cream morning sun,
confetti memories flutter from hummingbird wings, lost lives falling like shooting stars
far behind us
I am the air we breathe—
light, this body a husk, soul separated from shell,
weightless; this day I may be dead or dying, I know only that at last
I am unbound.