"Wave" by Josephine Florens
Anya Kirshbaum | I tell her
there’s a place none of this
touches us, & we can rest,
bodies relaxed beside a lake,
a slight wind on the water. I say—
we wake to a white sky curving
around the hemlocks, the ground a field
of leftovers—leaves, twigs, stormed
down branches of red cedar. We can hear
the geese sounding the horns, the dark-
eyed juncos & chickadee’s trilling.
In our shadowed room, I tell her this,
though she is already asleep
in a little bed, beside mine.
I’m thinking, I whisper—of sunbursts,
of fireflies, of a northern flicker’s
red cheeks. I’m thinking
of cat eyes, of a hummingbird’s
hum, of dusk light—violet resting
on lake water as it laps at the edge
of shore. I’m thinking, I say—
of the lit wetness that seeps
into sand again & again and the rim
of green scrub where you like to stand,
throwing stones, weighing their hefted
tones with your hands. And I’m thinking
of sitting together as I braid your hair,
watching the Canada geese chase
the smaller birds and in one great moaning
swoop, all of them scattering at once.
I love you like this, I say—a burst
of light, all one motion.
touches us, & we can rest,
bodies relaxed beside a lake,
a slight wind on the water. I say—
we wake to a white sky curving
around the hemlocks, the ground a field
of leftovers—leaves, twigs, stormed
down branches of red cedar. We can hear
the geese sounding the horns, the dark-
eyed juncos & chickadee’s trilling.
In our shadowed room, I tell her this,
though she is already asleep
in a little bed, beside mine.
I’m thinking, I whisper—of sunbursts,
of fireflies, of a northern flicker’s
red cheeks. I’m thinking
of cat eyes, of a hummingbird’s
hum, of dusk light—violet resting
on lake water as it laps at the edge
of shore. I’m thinking, I say—
of the lit wetness that seeps
into sand again & again and the rim
of green scrub where you like to stand,
throwing stones, weighing their hefted
tones with your hands. And I’m thinking
of sitting together as I braid your hair,
watching the Canada geese chase
the smaller birds and in one great moaning
swoop, all of them scattering at once.
I love you like this, I say—a burst
of light, all one motion.
Anya Kirshbaum (she/her) is a queer poet and somatic therapist living in Seattle, Washington. Her work has appeared in Mississippi Review, Whale Road Review, Crannóg, Solstice Literary Magazine, and elsewhere. She was a finalist for the New Millennium Writing Awards and the Patricia Dobler Poetry Award, was nominated for a 2024 Forward Prize, and was the recipient of the 2023 Banyan Poetry Prize. Her work is forthcoming in Best New Poets 2025.
Josephine Florens is a Ukrainian artist based in Germany. Her paintings explore identity, memory, and resilience through expressive color and symbolic form. Exhibited internationally, her works have appeared in journals and collections across Europe and North America.
