POEM
Haley Wooning

Tonight I think of animal sounds

the sound of wolves, inconsolable

my betrothal to

a deeper sea

I worry,

I am ungainly in love,

unsure and timid

I dress myself in the field

of moon, inscrutable

song-winged, onyx-eyed

I am weeds in the starlight,

fields mangled with asters

and burning with wing

I feel

a small, strange soul

adrift on ancient waters

there is no world that I know

I stay

in the dark movements

of beloved

the infinite mask, the origin of hunger

I pack myself in weakened salt,

the fir sapling of a lover’s lung

why must the field be

wretched with longing?

falling upon

the silence of ordinary things

who have I been, I wonder?

every year I forget my self, my life before

and begin again

I am not yet born , I feel unborn

ruled by dark seas

and darker

is anything stable or lasting ?

land takes back the forgotten name of water ,

and speaks it

yes, I am a part of you

---

Haley Wooning lives in California with her partner and cat, Puck. She is a grad student at Sacramento State University for Creative Writing, and is the co-founder and editor of Figroot Press. She has been published in a myriad of lit mags.