The Current and the Salt

1. Describe — Begin with a memory of intense heat, perhaps the weight of a midsummer afternoon, and let it dissolve into a cerulean light that feels like water. You might focus on the sensation of your skin cooling as the boundaries between the air and the tide begin to shimmer and blur. 2.

Compose — Write several lines where thoughts move like jellyfish, pulsing slowly through a space that is both a room you know and a vast, deep expanse. Consider how a sudden spark of electricity or a sharp word might ripple through this quiet, salt-heavy atmosphere, changing the color of everything it touches. 3.

Sketch — Close the poem by observing a single object from your real life—like a favorite mug or a smooth stone—resting at the bottom of this imagined sea. Imagine the way the sand settles around it, and notice how the objects we carry change when they are finally allowed to be still.

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