the fireworks are cracking open the air
and I’ve had just about enough of America
after serving people hot
dogs all day and watching
people eat them on TV so I march
into the woods into the mud into
the pond into my salamander
skin. I bury myself in the clag
until everything is wet,
hushed and warm.
I did this once before
ten years ago or so
when life had gotten noisy
I staggered through California’s redwoods
crawled under a fern, became
a newt, tried to swallow a banana
slug but got in way over
my head and had to stop speaking
for a while, digesting
its girth billowing
from my mouth.
When it was finished
I grew my human legs back
then belly, arms and the rest
and walked back into my life
working at the coffee shop
and having a girlfriend,
a brother and a best friend
like a woman can do.
It was alright for all those years
but now in the mud again
I don’t know how long I’ll be here
but I suspect if I sing Amazing Grace
into the gurgling water the frogs
will chime in then the birds
and rodents and cicadas
until it all sounds
like one sound.
Maybe then it will be time
to slide from the cooing muck
my body and go home.
Elise Ball
Elise Ball is an artist and writer from the San Francisco Bay Area, currently living in Southern Appalachia. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Queens University of Charlotte, and her work has been published or is forthcoming in publications such as TulipTree Review, Flyway, and Arc Poetry.
