the mountain by Ambalila Hemsell
the mountain
Ambalila Hemsellthrowing myself into the grey salt turbulence
of our marriage like a drunk and reckless sailor
after a poetry book thrown overboard
who is not afraid of death, I gulp and shiver
and swim and swim & don’t wish I was dry
& don’t wish I was warm & don’t wish I was
on the ship & don’t wish for no jellyfish
or no sharks & don’t wish I was sober. outside
of this metaphor, we are sober & wrecked with
grief. we are considering a decade of making
nothing but mistakes. inside the metaphor, the salt
pours into a hundred slices in my arms and legs
from when I crashed through the brush
on the way to the harbor. inside of the ocean,
I am pushed to the brink, where I realize
that death is not what I want and divorce isn’t
either. what I want is to swim until the whole
Pacific is sucked up into the atmosphere
& the dinosaurs return to earth & the butterflies
tornado around us and we wake up to our new selves
& the mountain is revealed. I want to rescue the book
and climb back aboard the ship.
KEEP READING
SHARED WITH GRATITUDE
This poem appeared in The Rumpus, 2022.
ABOUT AMBALILA HEMSELL
Ambalila Hemsell, who grew up in Colorado and South India, is the author of the poetry collection Queen in Blue. She holds an undergraduate degree from Reed College and an MFA in creative writing from the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan. She lives with her family in Tacoma, Washington. (Source)
Read more poems by Ambalila Hemsell • Find books by this poet on Amazon • Bookshop • Follow on Instagram • Website • Or view my library
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