I.
drifting down the Bow
our bodies, barely graze
bristled hair, forearms
fingertips
II.
trout skim the riverbed
they like the shallows
getting suntanned
shiny, luminous scales
for the summer
III.
Philomena says the water burns her skin
and when she cries, her cheeks blister and rift
tears
skin, blood and pus
drippings
but she’s at the riverbank, languishing on the shoreline
legs dipping in and out of the mouth
froth, fill the spaces
between bone and muscle
until there is nothing but bubbles
IV.
Olivier builds a boat out of odes and nods
odd dreams he’s had of lives not lived
tempting whims to sail away
showing like cured fat on the pads of his hands
he keeps a book beneath his pillow
where he says he will go to next
his boat is
a poetry of papier mache words, sporadic amalgamations glued together like a schizophrenic’s wallpaper
layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and layered and
he’ll get out of here if he keeps asking, he thinks
his words will carry him down the river flows
and into a new adventure,
but it’s something he must learn:
origami is only decorative