Only for so long – Conyer Clayton

Like a heavy-footed human,
certain stars pull closer every time

a wave decides not a break.
When I put my hand into water

it comes out clean.
Decide not to break today.

Home was her
and home was him.

Now home drags itself
everywhere, scattered

in the confines
of loss, a clover

shrinking towards the mainland
as soon as it spots an island.

If you build
a fence where

a seed already
rooted, the branches will

take a barrier shape.
It’s as easy as that.

A fly lands on the window
in front of me, and now that is home.

He crawls and vomits
on the sky itself,

digesting the horizon
quicker than it’s revealed.

Conyer Clayton has 6 chapbooks, recently Trust Only the Beasts in the Water (above/ground press, 2019). She won The Capilano Review’s 2019 Robin Blaser Poetry Prize, and writes reviews for Canthius. Her debut full-length collection of poetry, We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite, is forthcoming May 2020 with Guernica Editions.