by Kaecey McCormick
Ten moons pass through my body and at the end,
I birth a scythe. No stranger to pain, I pick it up,
wrap the wet curve in a blanket of pine needles
stitched by my grandmother’s hands. I carry it with me,
ignore the cuts and pricks given with every step.
After ten thousand miles it cuts a new row
through the field of weeds. I follow, searching for ghosts.
But they scurry-scuttle like beetles. When I find you
after years of missing each other, we fall together—
your leg against my hip, my hand inside your chest.
Our tongues move in waves to form the same question—
how did time slide?
In the distance, the scythe keeps slicing. The moon
fades black. And we stack bones for our nest.
Kaecey McCormick crafts poems and stories in the San Francisco Bay Area. Winner of the 2023 Connecticut Poetry Prize and past Cupertino Poet Laureate, her work appears in many literary journals as well as her two chapbooks. When not writing, Kaecey can be found people-watching, experimenting with paint, or hiking.
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