Taylor Brunson
THE CONNIVANCE
René Magritte, 1965
Stones turn their faces
to the light, asking
what is left to prove
that you can weather?
I have been tethered
to storms that strike
stones to sand, a language
tumbled smooth against
my tongue, a lure for storms
that beat seas to breaking.
Battering of rain,
what waves can take.
Claimed as mine: these
slicked musculatures, flex
of thunder darkened tides.
When I was first brought
here, I was prized as a fish.
Now, each of us, a silver scale
laid across the surface
of the lake. I brine where
murk makes meals
of refuse, uncertain of
what will kill me faster―
what the water asks
me to swallow,
what the horizon feels
I am owed, how easily
I am accompliced
in the death of my kind.
Taylor Brunson is a poet living in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where she recently graduated from UNC with highest honors for a manuscript of original poetry. Her work has recently been featured in Mineral Lit Mag, and she serves as an assistant poetry editor for Four Way Review and an assistant nonfiction editor for Nashville Review. Taylor can be found on Twitter, @taylor_thefox.