the sight of your waterlogged, shelled corpse,
drowned in a puddle of rainwater, surfaces
the flitting childhood memories of picking
your shells from Oregon tree bark. your diaphanous,
crackling remnants, palmed carefully
in infantile hands, as i resisted the urge to pluck
legs from your old lodging. your chatter used to
mix with the croak and warble of pacific chorus
frogs. Like them, you stayed out of view.
An invisible symphony that accompanied
the setting sun.
i peer down, now, at your yellowed, plastic-wrap
wings dissolved in stormwater and wonder
if that was how you died. I resist again, to pluck you
from the water and examine your full form —
eyes a misty and fading red, telling stories
of the seventeen years burrowed with your brood.
tymbalic vibrations in your gut, did you hunger
for the light and breeze of spring? had i heard your song
before you were swallowed by this shallow pool?
i hadn’t known
your eyes were red, or body black, until
now — you were so hard to find.
Ryan Crossman spent her childhood in Oregon, chasing after wildlife in creeks, under rocks, and in her moms garden. While she outgrew that phase for the most part, she still longs to have a pair of pet frogs. After graduating from her MFA at Eastern Washington University, this is her first time jumping back into writing (despite being a fiction writer!) and would be her third piece of published poetry.