stephanie roberts

Not Dead in a Ditch

you came home bull
urgent
i silk perfume
and natural disaster.
i sleep poorly without anchor
every brush of wind wakes.
now you are
taurus (as i said)
and the almost moon lays
light across you.
in an unwanted way
i spot
the shadow
of my fingers against
the shoulder of your
resistance.
i watch
the dark figure curl
uncurl
you don’t notice
because the moon never called your blood
with remembering.
every shush of wind
shakes me when you’re gone
your absence
one loss
too many.
i waited without calling
the police
i headless memory
already forgiving yourforgetting
your notresponding yournever
understanding
the anything of
absence.

stephanie roberts is the author of rushes from the river disappointment (McGill-Queen's University Press, June 2020) an A.M. Klein Poetry Prize finalist. Winner of The Sixty-Four: Best Poets of 2018 (Black Mountain Press) and a 2021 Canada Council for the Arts grant recipient, her work has been featured in POETRY, Shenandoah, Crannóg Magazine, New York Quarterly, Atlanta Review, and elsewhere. She was born in Panama, grew up in Brooklyn, NY, and lives in Québec. www.oceansandfire.com. Instagram: ringtales