Danielle Perry
she bestows a fraction of her power
onto her paramour // she watches
him swell with it, how it thumps
right underneath his skin // he rises
like the sun, takes the power she grants
him and fills the sky with it // she watches,
patiently, knowing that the sun must set
imagine this:
you are a mountain
and every person you love
is a lightning bolt.
how lonely do you feel,
illuminated for seconds
before the darkness
surrounds you again?
When I was nineteen I studied abroad in a small village in Italy; it remains one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life. The little grocery store there sold for a single euro tote bags with the name of the town and a picture of the castle from which it took its name. I bought one - as did many of the other students - and I have carried it across the Atlantic, up and down the east coast, and finally across the country, where it now hangs on my wall.
Danielle Perry graduated with a degree in English Lit and Religious Studies from Guilford College in Greensboro, NC. She now lives in Portland, OR, but will always be an East Coaster at heart. Her work has been published in The Toast, FLAPPERHOUSE, and Potluck Magazine, among others. Her chapbook Phases (2015) was published by Sad Spell Press.