Father taught me craft
was the way to catch
fish from a lure
minnow shining. Hope
was a fool’s lesson.
Skill was flesh hung
from a hook, cast
easily into indifferent water.
I pulled bodies breathless
from safety to shore,
watched rainbows thrash
at my muddied boots.
Flaking flesh from brittle
bone I feasted when full.
Sometimes I tossed bodies
back into the depths
with bloodied hands.
When water would not give
I learned the art of wading—
how to withstand the cold,
how to balance on shards
of glaciers river crushed,
how to risk your own drowning
to capture something glittering.
Sarah Fawn Montgomery is the author of Halfway from Home (Split/Lip Press, 2022), Quite Mad: An American Pharma Memoir (The Ohio State University Press, 2018), and three poetry chapbooks. She also has a craft book on unlearning the ableist workshop and developing a disabled writing practice forthcoming with Sundress Publications. She is an Associate Professor at Bridgewater State University.
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Heavy Feather Review 