wildscape. literary journal

My sister is sleeping in the river
by Stella Stocker

behind our old home. Snarls of algae 
ribbon in her hair. She smiles as frogs kiss 
her fingers like suitors, pink flashes of petals 

where their tongues should be. Before her 
I was alone. Cold saucers of murky tea. Pacing 
the length of the kitchen, trying everything to leave 

myself. Water whispering in the pipes the only 
voices to talk to me all day. Now she’s here. 
I sit between aisles of singing reeds and watch 

the turtles minister to ever-shaping water. 
This river has faith in rain, sand smoothing 
their beds, and the flow under freeze.

Everything is always changing except for me.

The words I want to say bubble and lace 
together in frilled hems at the stones’ ankles:

I will never know you as completely 
as I once did. We will lose sight of each other.

I am quiet and she drifts 
downstream, natural as anything,

I have to look away, my feet dangling 
in the water. The whirligigs are tracing 
my shadow endlessly, chewing. 

My sister sleeps and for a moment we are both 
still here. And we’re dreaming together again.

about the author // Stella Stocker