Katrina Kaye
I am trying
to remember
your eyes:
if they burst
around iris,
if they traded
shades of
yellow for grey.
Memory is a
flexible thing,
easily impassioned
or quickly buried
with the influence
of passing days.
You were a
bird I let
fly free but
desperately
hope to see
once more.
Your eyes were
not your best
feature, still,
I can’t help
but to search
for them in
the passing
of crowds.
“Sunburst” is previously published in You May Need to Hear This (2021).
Katrina Kaye
While our parents sit drinking
wine and discussing tomorrow,
we dress each other in mistletoe
and left over silver tinsel.
We make sashes of old strips of paper,
anklets and bracelets out of gold ribbon.
I am the one with the glittery bow,
you are the one in white.
With snips of the scissors
we turn one another into gypsy princesses.
You say we should paint our toenails red.
I say we should learn the violin.
Your mother gives us a tambourine,
faded blue peace sign on taut calfskin.
I poise my hand with imaginary bow
over invisible instrument
and with clanging clashes
we swish our juvenile hips.
We throw candy coins at each other’s feet
as we dance in the hallway to a rhythm-less beat.
After they have all gone to bed,
you trace the lifeline of my right hand
and tell a fate of sparrows crippled by autumn
with you in the past and migration destined.
I press my future between your lips
and believe every word.
“First Kiss” is previously published in The Fall of a Sparrow (2014) and A Scattering of Imperfections (2009).
Katrina Kaye
We build caves in the snow
to heal feelings of self destruction
in an effort to forget
our distaste for the world.
Are those still your baby teeth?
because, by now, we should be used
to the taste of meat.
We’re a little old to be pacified.
Yet we still pout lower lip,
dress in animal ears,
and cross arms in defiance.
Let’s play together.
Forget for a moment
the aches in our knees
and the thin skin of our hands.
Let’s rock on boats with broken boughs
and pretend it doesn’t matter where we drift.
Stay under.
Ignore the need for renewed breath.
I’ve been climbing mountains longer than you,
but you,
you know how to hold your fire underwater,
make rain out of nothing at all,
weave me in the dark,
breathe under floorboards.
It takes only a look escaping cracked eyes,
a word passing long tooth,
a head resting to exhausted breast,
to remind me,
after all this time,
you are still on my side.
“Too Old” is previously published in The Fall of a Sparrow (2014) by Swimming with Elephants Publications and ConnotationPress.com.
Chasing Rabbits 
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