Anne Gerard
​

Nostos

Like wet stones by the lake, I am looking to collect
all the promise once whispered to me, small, shining;
I hold the moments beneath the faucet and remember
each voice sounding in the dark. As if I could

prove displacement theory by drowning
everyone I love most underwater--
an actuary to measure the overflow,
grief or desire, pooling on the floor. (Math hurts

but so does singing.) Stop me if you’ve heard this,
but I don’t want to know any of the words to the songs
you know, just in case we’re ever speeding in the same car
again. I’m sorry, we spend our whole lives searching

for answers, but what comes after this? I used to line
my pockets full of rocks because it hurt to leave anything
behind—Even if something is beautiful doesn’t mean
you can keep it, doesn’t mean you should.
​
Now, so many gasping rocks in so many gasping jars.
And what can I do with all I’ve collected,
everything I’ve managed to save? We all return
somewhere. It can’t be the beginning.

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Turning

In every gray sky, every bird is a broken window.
And every river, unlike our bedroom mirror,
Is simply too far away.

The difference between a raven and a crow
Is that certain wings resemble fingers more than feathers.

In this half-light, there are no shadows to trace,
Only black shards soaring.

Somewhere, a blur:
Distance being best mediated
By the speed at which one can fall through it.

I walked along the water’s edge. I looked for my own outline.
Hard to tell if the pieces ever fit together.

From here anything could be an opening.
Already so many dead leaves covering the ground.

​There was a season before this one.
And then you made the world colder.
So cold I watched my fingers blush.

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Anne Gerard lives in Las Vegas, where she is pursuing an MFA. Born in Detroit, and raised in the midwest, she misses the Great Lakes every day.