I’m floating in the bathtub
my nose like a buoy,
air flowing through its tip.
The water so still, I’m expecting a fog.
I want to be a ghost. I say out loud.
I don’t want to die, just hover
outside the sanctuary that is the body.
Humans are always searching for ways to fly.
I stay in the water until it’s icy.
My body begins to shiver.
I cry, the tears becoming the bathwater.
I cry, like anyone who has lost a secret.
Author Bio:
Ben Westlie holds an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts. He is the author of four chapbooks of poems, most recently UNDER YOUR INFLUENCE all published by Finishing Line Press. His poems have appeared in the anthology Time You Let Me In: 25 Poets Under 25 selected and edited by Naomi Shihab Nye and in the journals The Fourth River, Third Coast, Atlas and Alice, The Talking Stick, the tiny journal, Trampset and ArLiJo (Arlington Literary Journal).
my nose like a buoy,
air flowing through its tip.
The water so still, I’m expecting a fog.
I want to be a ghost. I say out loud.
I don’t want to die, just hover
outside the sanctuary that is the body.
Humans are always searching for ways to fly.
I stay in the water until it’s icy.
My body begins to shiver.
I cry, the tears becoming the bathwater.
I cry, like anyone who has lost a secret.
Author Bio:
Ben Westlie holds an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts. He is the author of four chapbooks of poems, most recently UNDER YOUR INFLUENCE all published by Finishing Line Press. His poems have appeared in the anthology Time You Let Me In: 25 Poets Under 25 selected and edited by Naomi Shihab Nye and in the journals The Fourth River, Third Coast, Atlas and Alice, The Talking Stick, the tiny journal, Trampset and ArLiJo (Arlington Literary Journal).
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