Afterimages
It is spring again and the sky
is unpossessable. Someone I will love
touches me with the bluest hands
like mist billowing into
a terrible, gleaming future.
Where our children cartwheel in a field
striated with weeds and ribbons
of birds loop around the periphery,
wanting what I want,
a way to beat an image
into brightness.
Behind us, the hills
slope in brushstrokes over a lake,
soft and washed out, like the place
fires go after burning.
Our bodies become stations of light
when the sun dips.
I surrender to an engine-low breeze,
the chance of violins,
swans just out of frame.
The lake rocks the moon.
The moon rocks my pale blue ache.
It is so shameful
for anything to persist:
graffiti, oil pastels,
a dying flame.
In the morning, dragonflies
crowd against the glass, choking
each other. Minor wars go on.
My heart cannot help
but follow,
beating when the blue wings touch.
Evan Bode is an award-winning filmmaker, writer, composer, and animator whose work explores gender identity, challenging borders and binaries with a playful mix of mediums. Evan graduated with honors from Colorado State University in 2020 with a B.A. in Communication Studies and minors in Sociology, English, and Film Studies. Currently, they attend Syracuse University as an MFA candidate in the Film program. Evan's first-year film, Thine Own Self, has screened at festivals around the world including Animafest Zagreb. In 2021, Evan was one of five filmmakers selected as a winner of the Gotham Institute’s 2021 Student Showcase sponsored by JetBlue and Focus Features, a success featured in Filmmaker Magazine.
Mackenzie Duan is a high schooler from the Bay Area who has received recognition from the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, Youngarts, Princeton University, and The Poetry Society. Their work appears or is forthcoming in Black Warrior Review, Frontier Poetry, Electric Literature, Sine Theta, and elsewhere. They love Frank Ocean and the rain.