Laura Stringfellow
On Conasauga Mountain
The fog drags
into these woods,
smoky and thick,
and we are damp
with its spray.
All morning,
we have been in the
mist of this cloud
and we move through it
as though we could part it
with the soft, rushing movement
of our bodies--
the way a canoe gently slices
the skin of a smooth water--
the way it did yesterday.
Looking out
between the tall spruce,
over the mountain fern
and the long, silver beak
of the canoe,
hearing the call
of the wood thrush
in the background
we remember
that we are made up of rain.
The wetness of the air is ripe,
my feet grow down into the earth.
The fog is like a dream
that we cannot keep.
Right now,
we are at the very
edge of the mountain
and the lake
that was there
has suddenly become
sky.
On Conasauga Mountain
The fog drags
into these woods,
smoky and thick,
and we are damp
with its spray.
All morning,
we have been in the
mist of this cloud
and we move through it
as though we could part it
with the soft, rushing movement
of our bodies--
the way a canoe gently slices
the skin of a smooth water--
the way it did yesterday.
Looking out
between the tall spruce,
over the mountain fern
and the long, silver beak
of the canoe,
hearing the call
of the wood thrush
in the background
we remember
that we are made up of rain.
The wetness of the air is ripe,
my feet grow down into the earth.
The fog is like a dream
that we cannot keep.
Right now,
we are at the very
edge of the mountain
and the lake
that was there
has suddenly become
sky.
Laura Stringfellow writes both verse and prose poetry, holds an MFA in Creative Writing, Poetry, and hails from the muggy strangelands of the Southern US. Recent publications have appeared, or are forthcoming, in journals including Right Hand Pointing, Neologism Poetry Journal, Déraciné, Eunoia Review, Clementine Unbound, and Nine Muses Poetry.