"I-93" by Michelle McElroy
Two poems by Divyasri Krishnan
Fig Wasps
Holy: a river through a stand of trees. Sun.
Holy: how you crack the thing with your thumb. Scratch out the sweet seeds with nails pink as
spit after cherry lollipops, cut to the quick.
Holy: the afternoon, all ours.
Holy: solitude, also comfort, our breasts at this age no longer budding but full bloom and
unbound under tight white shirts. Our thighs, skin taut under palms, like ripe mangos
how they curve into open-skinned knees.
Holy: our voices, another form of birdsong. No serrated edge of anger.
Holy: how I eat from your palm and get spit everywhere.
Holy: when you tell me about the fig wasps, and how they make their home in the sweet
flesh, and I shudder. Every time I snap a seed between my teeth, I imagine a wasp’s
body.
Holy: how I tell you this, and it nearly brings you to tears.
Holy: the river silvering in the sun. I wonder if iit gouged a path through the trees, or if the trees
took root around it. I wonder the difference between violence and change.
Holy: the hill-and-valley dip of your waist, home to me, my cheek to the pulsing, living skin.
Holy: how my love for you consumes me.
Holy: the wasps, whose world at birth is the fig. All they know is sweetness and warmth. The
rest of the world is violent in its scale, the anger of the wind, the water that lashes
and cuts. The complexity of desire, fear, ache. How the wasp knows none of it.
Holy: how we found a place secluded from violence. How we found respite from change.
Holy: that I left my fig behind eighteen years ago. I hold a piece of it in you.
Holy: how you crack the thing with your thumb. Scratch out the sweet seeds with nails pink as
spit after cherry lollipops, cut to the quick.
Holy: the afternoon, all ours.
Holy: solitude, also comfort, our breasts at this age no longer budding but full bloom and
unbound under tight white shirts. Our thighs, skin taut under palms, like ripe mangos
how they curve into open-skinned knees.
Holy: our voices, another form of birdsong. No serrated edge of anger.
Holy: how I eat from your palm and get spit everywhere.
Holy: when you tell me about the fig wasps, and how they make their home in the sweet
flesh, and I shudder. Every time I snap a seed between my teeth, I imagine a wasp’s
body.
Holy: how I tell you this, and it nearly brings you to tears.
Holy: the river silvering in the sun. I wonder if iit gouged a path through the trees, or if the trees
took root around it. I wonder the difference between violence and change.
Holy: the hill-and-valley dip of your waist, home to me, my cheek to the pulsing, living skin.
Holy: how my love for you consumes me.
Holy: the wasps, whose world at birth is the fig. All they know is sweetness and warmth. The
rest of the world is violent in its scale, the anger of the wind, the water that lashes
and cuts. The complexity of desire, fear, ache. How the wasp knows none of it.
Holy: how we found a place secluded from violence. How we found respite from change.
Holy: that I left my fig behind eighteen years ago. I hold a piece of it in you.
Having Overheard the Secrets of the World
I realize I don’t need much. Just a little sun,
not too much, interrupted at intervals by
curious oaks inclining their heads over the
rain-slick strip of road. A sky too close to my
forehead. It’s been five years since I called a
swingset mine; I’m still searching for that high.
I want an upswing that lasts longer than
an echo of light. They’ll never tell you this:
one day you come down and never go up
again. I don’t need much. Just everything--
a little bigger, a little bit more. Let the sun
burn a few years longer. Let the steam curling
up from the pavement after rain not dissipate
so soon. Let my lover stay a while, uncertain
in the kitchen where I can stare at her until
I get sick of her features. Then let her go.
And let me miss her a little longer than I
should, so when she comes back my love
is that much greater. Let the places where
we played not change except to grow a little
wider, to accommodate our new bodies. And
let the downswing last longer, so that the
upswing will linger. The sky, just a little bit closer.
not too much, interrupted at intervals by
curious oaks inclining their heads over the
rain-slick strip of road. A sky too close to my
forehead. It’s been five years since I called a
swingset mine; I’m still searching for that high.
I want an upswing that lasts longer than
an echo of light. They’ll never tell you this:
one day you come down and never go up
again. I don’t need much. Just everything--
a little bigger, a little bit more. Let the sun
burn a few years longer. Let the steam curling
up from the pavement after rain not dissipate
so soon. Let my lover stay a while, uncertain
in the kitchen where I can stare at her until
I get sick of her features. Then let her go.
And let me miss her a little longer than I
should, so when she comes back my love
is that much greater. Let the places where
we played not change except to grow a little
wider, to accommodate our new bodies. And
let the downswing last longer, so that the
upswing will linger. The sky, just a little bit closer.
Divyasri Krishnan’s work has been published in Muzzle Magazine, Third Point Press, GASHER Journal, and elsewhere. She has further been recognized by Palette Poetry, the Adroit Journal, the National YoungArts Foundation, the National Alliance for Young Artists and Writers, and the Poetry Society of the UK. In 2020, she was a Pushcart Prize nominee and a Best of the Net finalist. She reads for the Adroit Journal.
Michelle McElroy is a native New Englander who studied painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and has worked at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Skinner Auction House and Historic New England. Interested by how light and shadow can transform everyday scenes are constant inspiration. These are images that she may see on early morning runs, midnight snacks in the kitchen or simple observations of everyday scenes that people can connect with or create a narrative of their own. Michelle’s work has been accepted into various juried shows in galleries around the United States and actively shows at local venues, such as libraries and cafes. She is a member of the Cambridge Art Association, Edward Hopper House, and Center for the Arts in New London, New Hampshire. Michelle lives in New Hampshire with her husband and two cats. Instagram: @michellemcelroyart Website: michellemcelroy.com
