[There are many signs of sand: the horseflies]

There are many signs of sand: the horseflies

that buzz inside something that died,

washed ashore, its own source of heat.

Our shadows dragged down, the jackfruit

decayed and unstrung, the stranded sound

of the absent gulls. Nothing aloft or ahead—

no moment-to-be when we won’t feel our feet

leave the ground. The sand is a washrag unwrung.

Kimberly Kralowec is the author of The Saplings Think of Us as Young (Kelson Books, 2023) and a chapbook of love poems, We retreat into the stillness of our own bones (Tolsun Books, 2022). She was a finalist in the 2023 North American Review James Hearst Poetry Contest, the 2022 American Literary Review Poetry Contest, and the 2021 River Styx International Poetry Contest. A lawyer by profession, she lives in San Francisco. Find her at anapoetics.com.