Donna Vorreyer

A fox at midnight. Vines of moonflowers creamy in the low glow of their namesake. Night-blooming morning glory. Ipomoea alba. But a lovely moment explained loses its magic.

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The fleshy drupe of a cherry is not delicious on its own. So much trouble to remove the stone, the hands stained scarlet. Some things need to be sugared soft enough to swallow.

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At the shore, messages written in the sand disappear. Write Stay, write I miss you, and the surf erases it. Move back, repeat on a drier canvas. Language need not be permanent to be true.

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Better with faces than with names, better with words than numbers, my reward is stories and forgetting. Better with blankets than mirrors. Under the blankets, some forgetting hurts less.

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This is the story: a woman went to the ocean. The air was thick and misty, and she swallowed it, greedy for sweetness. The hourglass continued its slow sieve to stillness, time a stone and a cherry.

This is the story: the woman was alone. She thought she heard the wind whisper Stay. Then a rustle behind her. A fox in the reeds. A little magic beneath a crescent moon.