When I stepped out of the dream-church
a black lake shone where I expected
a parking lot. The water’s edge went right
to my house and as I walked around the water,
sturgeon surfaced, the shining, bony plates
of their long, armored bodies arced
out of the water like slow-turning blades.
I heard them tell me your body
is not a project and I wanted to argue
but they were away in the silver-grey
work of living in water. They moved somewhere
near me, muscular and gentle in the darkness.
by Amy Ratto Parks
Amy Ratto Parks is the author of three collections of poetry and a verse novel, Radial Bloom (Folded Word Press, 2018), which earned a Kirkus Review star and was called “contemplative and original” and “brilliant, at once dense and ethereal.” She lives and works in Missoula, Montana.
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