Once we shook through a thicket and sat
by a stream to catch pollywogs in mason jars—
big, thick ones—where we watched the little ‘poles
skitter through the murk, making more room
for themselves. We clutched the jars of pond.
We liked knowing a little thing could undo the fusion
of its shape like a change of clothes—just that change,
like some kids kicking up dandelion clouds, then coming
back to the field and finding a fat yellow garden.

We were kids, but we knew metamorphosis:
hacking through the shell, skeleton skin
to make it to the next clique or homecoming dance.
Whatever it took to grow some new bones
and find ourselves hunched over at the back of a party,
regretting the booze and the boy with the lip ring
who saw our naked breasts, knowing his eyes
were large, empty vases clambering
for something to put inside their bellies.

It’s the something everyone is looking for
before skin and spine begin shrinking
into bare-boned trees when the cold comes,
being held together like a kindergarten paper mache.
We went into the thicket to get thick with mudpies,
skip rocks, and rhyme. To exhale our future selves
in detail: the astronauts brimming over
the endlessness of space, learning to breathe
on other planets in the largeness of space armor,
finding new streams, tracing our names into the mud.

•

Bayleigh Fraser is the editor of Caesura Poetry Magazine, an e-publication that focuses on publishing new and emerging poets. Her work has appeared in publications such as A Bad Penny Review, Motley Press and The Social Poet.