Bull Frogs Croon (Suite) - Aoife O'Donovan, Jeremy Kittel

The water is a glaze

Like loneliness at ease with itself

I cast and close my eyes for the whir out across the water

The line striking the surface

And sinking

I like waiting

For it to settle on the bottom

Then I jig it up a little

I imagine

The lure in utter dark

I play it lightly.

Fish rise

Just shy of the surface

They play their glints

Off the moon on the water

I see too my own loneliness

It’s not too big

And it breathes easily

Soon, it may pretend it’s rain

Soon, it may pretend it’s rain

Rain blurs the water

There is nothing wrong

With rain

I take a deep breath and I cast

And cast

Say you are out for a walk

And somewhere through the trees

You walk out of everything in your head

Or off by a window in thought

And what you look out to

A crease of trees perhaps you don’t see at all

But what you are thinking there in the trees

As you open like this through a window

Or walk and walk into a glazing

Then say darkness falls

Darkness farther back than the cave you felt into

Farther back than violence to animals

Darkness farther back than water you dove into

Hands in front of your face

To feel your way down and know

This darkness did not begin did not gather

Then something backing off it seems as you come in

Re-renters you and crosses you over

The sleep of the living and the dead

Big frogs croak

Baby frogs slither;

I’d rather go broke

Than not be with her

Bull frogs croon

Slugs wiggle wider;

I’d live in ruin

To lie down beside her