Why I ask for you to come in dreams
       

because the first time, you were a
replica of before, the avenues

of grief split open like a fist, my synapses charged
and hot.

Because the second time I found you.
Your sleek composition hidden in a wetfield

sprung up from the mouth of an oyster,
lean, translucent grass, saying, wind swept me this way.

Because the last time I saw you in this life
you confessed your desire to change shape,

drought body, stagnant landscape—
I'm tired of this.

Because sometimes at night
I can't shake how a body can own and then

disown its form.

The third time, in dream: do you know the stones
are listening even though they are dead?

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Copyright © 2022 Brooke Sahni All rights reserved
from Before I Had the Word
Texas Review Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission