[Alexandra Baez]

Revision

If I’m an Eddying Pocket in a Stream


You’re like a leaf—you simply slipped away.
The current always meant to take you off—
you, little twirling thing that caught my eye,
as I caught yours. Life’s restive things don’t stay.

They’ll ornament the place they’ve paused awhile
and won’t get too attached—but just get stuck
as if near weirs of twiglets in a dip
at stream’s edge where loose clutter stalls, awhirl,
and then starts clumping up, a floating pile
of flotsam from the lettings-go of fall.

“Forever yours!” you cried inside my pool.

And then you slid between my twiglet-tips
back to the streamlet ripples scurrying south . . .
I sank into the silt beneath my mouth
but tasted your remainders on my lips.


Revisions
S1 L1: period at end was colon
S2 L2: first letter was lower case
S2 L3: added "if" after "as"
S2 L4: added comma at end
S1 L3: added comma after "eye"
S1 L4: removed parentheses around "as I caught yours," and period at end was semicolon
S2 L3: "clutter" was "matter"
S2 L7: tried merging with S2, then went back to having it as a separate line
Removed former S3:
I’d peered at you, a glinting slip of amber
corralled by my involuntary pull,
a standout in this season’s soggy haul.
S4 L3: Was "I sank into the bottoms of my mouth"; "bottoms" was "barrel"


Original

The “Keeper”


You’re like a leaf—you simply slipped away:
the current always meant to take you off—
you, little twirling thing that caught my eye
(as I caught yours.) Life’s restive things don’t stay;

they’ll ornament the place they’ve paused awhile
and won’t get too attached—but just get stuck
as in a weir of twiglets in a dip
at stream’s edge where loose matter stalls, awhirl
and then starts clumping up, a floating pile
of flotsam from the lettings-go of fall.

I’d peered at you, a glinting slip of amber
corralled by my involuntary pull,
a standout in this season’s soggy haul.

“Forever yours!” you cried inside my palm.

And then you slid between my twiglet-tips
back to the streamlet ripples scurrying south . . .
I sank into the barrel of my mouth
but tasted your remainders on my lips.