Silhoutte of a Girl by Quincy Gordon ‘22

In waters that hate her whole being just enough To hold her down and clamp her lips shut To run her through with one last speargun To roar above the whispers And the bathing And the water And the And the The

Lena Jones ‘20 I think I I think I made it

Silhouette of a Girl Quincy Gordon ‘22 14 Pillars of Salt

God’s Hill

I remember you told me you stopped going to youth group because there’s no proof that God exists. I told you that God has to be real because I met her in the shower.

Maybe that’s why it’s easy to fall in love in the rain.

My shower is as close to rain as I can get in LA. She hand sews pearls onto her veil and calls it Los Angeles. We call ourselves fools for wanting to be married so young. I try on a white dress with too much fabric that lets us imagine. At seventeen I am full of dreams1. I wear promises to myself on every finger. I imagine plucking the petals off this dress until you can see my ankles and know that one day I will wear only one ring.

At age six we moved away from New York and the rain became a blessing. I used to long for the rain; every time it visited I came back inside whispering to myself that it was the best day I’d ever had. I wanted to chase it all the way back to the East Coast where it came down warmer and the leaves listened louder.

Dad can name every type of bird and tells me how to spot an oak tree by its leaves but he can’t ever tell me how much longer the rain will last. I stick my arm through the branches that form a dark arch, to check if it’s a portal to a fairy land. We watch the rain tap on the roots like lightning about to burst. I promise so many versions of myself that I’ll move to the East coast when I get older. For now, I can shower when I miss the feeling of rain tucked behind my ear.

The other night the rain was trying to swallow my roof whole. The rain sounds like how fireworks crackle on the surface of summer’s lake. I’ve never understood when people say rain sounds like the sky is crying. I’ve also never understood when people write as if there are multiple skies