Catch

little’s favourite time of day is when we agree that a saturday feels like a sunday. big won’t tell us his but we know he’s trying to keep mornings a
secret. me, i like blue. i like when my shadows are tall as they want to be. or no, i like when water’s the air but i know they’re around cause they howl
their whale songs. i’m not usually very good at just catching (i tip over light i trip over) but today i caught something so big even little had to be
impressed. we were under the oak when its shadow caved ours, when a new one took both and we swam in the shade. little said when i see
something falling it’s always a bird, as, i can’t say what it was, but i caught it. i let it go too, and that taught them something. i know cause their bellies
were wide.

Kick

little finds a puddle and says please so we jump. we look at each other and wriggle. it’s sunny brown like the storm of an eye, jellyfish bags and the
sticks. little isn’t afraid. we don’t need the air. we kick up our legs and our feet. our hair clings to the surface like we are the roots. big likes to breathe
so he says he’ll keep watch, so we watch as the sunrain makes him a fresco. he scatters himself tossing wishes for us. he tugs his morse code in our
scalps. t-h-e b-i-r-d i-s h-e-r-e. t-h-e r-i-b-b-o-n i-s s-w-e-e-t. sometimes little and i are too good at hearing, which is why we like to sing underground.
big tosses his mug to make our tea party real and little one traps my left ear. he says your widow’s peak, i forgot. and i hear him. a widow? he says,
and i nod. i point up and hum. he thinks i say rog, or i do. can’t remember.

Bruise

i’m in love says little, upside down to us— oh really we say— yes. we wait. he says look. as the day brims overflows and blooms into dusk, the streets
reflecting that orange, the blue. we lie with him, backs bruising ant dunes, and it’s a different day when a dragonfly stops, having survived two
extinctions, to shudder in pollen, as a seagull swoops higher and we picture the dirt as a ceiling. backs glued up, looking down. the wind piles its day
on our lips. the ants clamber over and sting us to earth. little says taking a breath reminds me of all the breaths i’ve taken before. he rolls over to kiss a
violet’s short forehead and says colour’s so different when it’s alive. the streetlights shimmer drosophila. he looks up and says, there you are.