Dreams of the Drowned
By Wendi M. Lee 

My dreams resuscitate the air
back into lungs, arms and bones awakened, clotted crown of funeral
dirt cut from your hair.

You are whole again.
I press one ear to the thrum
of your livid heart, loud enough to drown husbands.

Death did not suit you. Instead you prefer
our brambled days, dazed by river silt
gliding through cupped fingers. The murmur

of water against stone disturbs you not. You have been
to the depths, witnessed the pulse of blood fade and flow.
You know this river like a prayer.

Your eye, you say. Now that is a sad death. My veil
glistens tears in the clench of light, empty socket
a full dull ache. Your hands reach out, read my mourning like Braille.

And I burn with dark prayers of my own:
to drown in these dreams, or wake intact,
my girlhood bed of wrought iron and gingham, alone.