lean òran

Trail the ridge

up to its breastbone

& you shall

see: the ocean

is in love with

the boy / the ocean

is in love

& the boy is

yearning / a cadence of

wanting / waterbirds

unfurling like

silent

witness / the ocean's

loudness / the boy's

quietness / breath faithful

to a living

river / the

river, yes, is

in-

side / a sting

cloaked with

cardinals / for

ocean: a thrum of

aftersong / beaks

brightening the

current / for

boy: a gathering of

salt,

symphony / fingers

uncurling into

a kingdom / for

both: signs

dressed as

silences / the wind

learning,

learning / a tiny

humbling

walking

through

us

back to issue

Eartha Davis is a woman of Ngāpuhi heritage living on Wurundjeri land. Rivers are the loves of her lives. Her work is published or forthcoming in the Australian Poetry Anthology, Wildness, Cordite, Rabbit, South Coast Writer’s Centre, takahē, Frozen Sea, Minarets, Circular Publishing, Baby Teeth Journal, South Florida Poetry Journal, Revolute, JMWW, LEON Literary Review, and ELJ Editions, among others. She is currently working with Red Room Poetry on their POEM FOREST project. She dreams of mountains.