Anne Holub
Image by Kenneth Gorzal Surillo on Pexels
Anne Holub’s poetry has been featured on Chicago Public Radio and in The Doubleback Review, The Mississippi Review, The Asheville Poetry Review, Phoebe, and The Beacon Street Review (now Redivider), among other publications, and in the anthology Bright Bones: Contemporary Montana Writing, (Open Country Press). She received a MFA from the University of Montana and a MA from Hollins University. Originally from Charlottesville, Virginia, she now lives and writes in Montana with her husband Dan, their two dogs Merle and Rosie, and a sourdough starter named Larry (RIP) Rhonda.
Dive
we tell ourselves in summer —
slick patches darkening under arms,
between legs caught too long
against vinyl seats.
Released from a long drive (the promise of destination)
with sucking sounds like a cap opened slowly.
Like some foreign filament stuck between
your teeth that you just can't give up on.
Gazes adjust from above the water
to catch shadow from a darker patch of light
— how deep is it here?
Could we leap from rocks
and blow small bubbles skyward until our feet
land silted in the crushed sand
atop the bodies
of ancient phytoplankton that fell too far below the surface
those unlucky ones that
caught the wrong current that
couldn't reach the light.
If we dove
headfirst would we break our necks?
What caution are we
throwing to where
our mothers stand
trying not to look concerned?
We should hold a rope and ease in,
form a human chain and shuffle feet (one/two)
until someone kicks a lump of something / no one / no body
wishes to find.
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