Slipping the Moorings
by Chris Garrecht-Williams

Dear an hour north the trees
are already shuttered leaves

whip my face and the lake
is lashed to whitewash while

back home our initials grow
dim erosion smoothes cement

and names and your lover writes me
letters detailing your predilections

in colored pencils asking for friendship
I suppose she does you well out here

in the forest the season is brewing
and no one minds the strange

accent the new girl wears around
her neck with a cross our senses shatter

on punctuation and dropped Roman
vowels streetlights and shadows

follow sirens deep into the maze
of named streets while here a fox

has been eating chickens one by one
in the skeleton night where once

a shiv of moon grew flat on our lake
while snow fell and held the light