my sister tells me what it’s like to run across the roof of a repair shop:
it made noises like the Mount Storm floor and I thought I was going to fall everywhere.
. almost-euphemism—the floor of our fear
. holds the name of our hometown—that peak of heavy rain.
we carry home half-alive venus flower traps wanting to preserve
something. we carry home crabapples
already bittering in the backyard. we want to be
ready, still, clutching the debris. years later we laugh, how escape meant
. following stones fossilized with our own smaller footprints.
dead mice in jewelry boxes under the rock moon. cycles repeat themselves—
domestic burials traded for feral traps. moons for suns and teeth. little bones
a sign of neglect. to dig them up would be to ask
. had they been fed enough?
SOPHIE HALL writes about homes and fears, especially where the two overlap. Her work has been supported by the Looking Glass Rock Writers’ Conference, Writing By Writers, and the Bucknell Seminar for Undergraduate Poets—and published by Outpost19, RUBY, the Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest, and others. Also a teacher, postcard collector, frog parent, and lover of orchids, these days, Sophie is most dedicated to her dream journal. Sophie can be found on Instagram @sophieuhmanda.
