By Lacie Semenovich
Teach me to study
the movement of hair in the wind,
the touch of sunrise,
leaf by leaf, burning up the trees.
Teach me to sing
in a language only dogs can hear.
Teach me to stare down
one-eyed chameleons that don’t blink.
Teach me to feel nightfall
with the tips of my toes.
Teach me to touch my lover
with a churning of words
and a flick of my pen.
Teach me to tear open
the family photographs and
pull out the truth of our pain
and love.
Teach me to roll around in my words,
to follow them down the hill and
into the bosom of a stanza.
Teach me to transcribe
the birds’ song from my windowsill,
to hear my houseplants gossip
about the fly on the wall.
Teach me to dig through the words
with an archeologist’s pick,
brush the dust from the bones
and see where they point.
Lacie Semenovich is the author of a chapbook, Legacies (Finishing Line Press, 2012). Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in B O D Y, Nixes Mate Review, Misfit Magazine, Shrew Literary Magazine, and other journals. She lives in Cleveland, Ohio.
Portage Magazine 