‘Waves,’ A Poem by Jana Prikryl

True little waves, from high above in a window seat
so few of you have enough of yourselves
to fold over onto, forming a dress

you wear out instantly, the most part
of you is continuous skin with its own living
texture curving over the bottom, a bone, though often enough

on land it appears you’re falling
all over yourselves to be tallest, each of you
prim threat of drowning should I contemplate

a swim, the window seat is just a way of taking in
the danger all at once, breathing the ultimatum in
and trying to breathe it back out at decent intervals.

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Excerpted from No Matter. Copyright © 2019 by Jana Prikryl. Published by Tim Duggan Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.