VINYL POETRY

Volume 5, March 2012

BIRDIE
Sara Eliza JohnsonView Contributor’s Note

The Drowned Come Back in Spring

Though water blooms their skulls, a garden
where the voice rots beyond hearing, you will hear
them come. Listen for the rusted
gate. Listen, the horses startle. A body comes
to stand at your door like a broken

lighthouse. Wash away the salt, the blood, warm
the tongue and it will name the shape
of your hands. The map will come back into its body
and so the body to its map. As the spring light
floods each vessel, each petal of sweat

across the backs of the horses. As we all must raise
kingdoms with only our hands. Shine
your lantern on the last black flower wilting in the stone
of her skull, then reach inside and pluck it
from its centuries of darkness.