It’s about not cutting your feet on broken tiles. High heels have no place in contact sports and sharp turns avoid stains made by bleeding toes. Floating at the low tide line, the dead man’s fingers will reach towards you greenly, looking soft and cool.
Once Elisa discovered the abandoned manor with its quake shattered patio, she refused to dance anywhere else, preferring the feel of the sand and worn sea shells that drifted across the flooring. Shattered terra cotta urns and the broken fountainhead somehow reassuring. Fog was optional to the dance and the moon kept its own calendar.
When the summer light allowed, she’d walk the shore to drape herself in red sea lace, the algae cooling her skin. At the ocean’s edge she’s careful to avoid stepping on the witches hair, careful to avoid the curses of learned ancients, pausing only for salt-seeded green ribbons to tie back her silver hair.
Partners were problematical until she realized any crustacean would do, an exoskeleton offering a frame equal to that of any Arthur Murray teacher. She just needed to locate a really tall lobster.
Trina Gaynon
Trina Gaynon has poems in the anthologies Saint Peter’s B-list: Contemporary Poems Inspired by the Saints, Obsession: Sestinas for the 21st Century, A Ritual to Read Together: Poems in Conversation with William Stafford, Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: Anthology of Sonnets of the Early Third Millennium, Bombshells and Knocking at the Door, as well as numerous journals including Natural Bridge, Reed and the final issue of Runes. Her chapbook An Alphabet of Romance is available from Finishing Line Press.
Artwork: Bella Kotak, “saphira..”
Website: http://www.bellakotak.com/
Gingerbread House Lit Mag 