"Charon" by Josephine Florens
Nicole Dufalla | night shift lullaby
What if instead of this paver we stood
on a slim schooner, cutting slowly
through molten waves & instead of spreading
petroleum rocks, we night fishers cast
silver nets for golden fish & the oily
scraping shovel was an oar leaving
rippled asphalt in its wake & the humming
generator was the low string
of the moon’s guitar & compactors rolled
the tar laden seas, a moon kneading waves
like bread & the diesel fumes filling
our lungs were pines from a distant shore
& we navigated by the globe light star, swarmed
by fairy moths dancing against the poured
ink night & we pointed to cigarette ember
constellations to tell stories while we shivered, waiting
for tugging nets & the steam rising from the surface
was gray morning fog & the iridescent puddles
swirling at our boots were the scales of half-moon
herrings & if I sing myself this lullaby would
this knot loosen & finally cast me adrift?
on a slim schooner, cutting slowly
through molten waves & instead of spreading
petroleum rocks, we night fishers cast
silver nets for golden fish & the oily
scraping shovel was an oar leaving
rippled asphalt in its wake & the humming
generator was the low string
of the moon’s guitar & compactors rolled
the tar laden seas, a moon kneading waves
like bread & the diesel fumes filling
our lungs were pines from a distant shore
& we navigated by the globe light star, swarmed
by fairy moths dancing against the poured
ink night & we pointed to cigarette ember
constellations to tell stories while we shivered, waiting
for tugging nets & the steam rising from the surface
was gray morning fog & the iridescent puddles
swirling at our boots were the scales of half-moon
herrings & if I sing myself this lullaby would
this knot loosen & finally cast me adrift?
Nicole Dufalla teaches engineering in Virginia where she enjoys writing and getting lost outside. Her poems can be found or are forthcoming in Poetry South, River Heron Review, Sky Island Journal, and elsewhere online.
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.
