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fasting will clear your mind, she said. and i wanted to finish the story. i wanted to close my eyes and watch it all unravel like a loose thread in a red sweater. styled and swift, a river fish, i imagined, flexing and leaping straight out of the water. bold and behemoth in my own mind, i grew new skin overnight. eyes shining, hair tumbling forth before me. all this grass carpet under my winter feet. the sandals shushed away for july. the lake lapping itself alone. i dreamed food i’d never tasted, planted persimmons baked into pie. old walnuts in a bowl and then remembered the pecan tree that crashed to the ground in your grandparents back yard during my first hurricane. how you kept saying i was saying it wrong. they had evacuated and we camped out at their house for days. watched deep electric silver cloud growl over us. the power was out and we walked to the levy to watch the river push back upstream. catfish, crawfish, alligators. dirty tasting swamp monsters. i ate it all before i left. before i learned to go without.
