"LONG DISTANCE" by Stephanie Kaylor

Stephanie Kaylor is a PhD student in Feminist Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. They are Reviews Editor of Glass: A Journal of Poetry. Her recent work can be found in publications including Hobart, Protean, and Softblow.​

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LONG DISTANCE


I photograph the ocean to show you there was a moment in which I remembered our smallness, in which I placed the shell to my ear and heard not the roar of past lives but the miles between us. I was never faithless enough to believe there is no smell of salt. Once it meant closeness, the peeling of earth-worn limbs folded into themselves, an indiscernible core. I cut apples into spears when you feared a bite would break your teeth. how effortlessly we crumble. I photograph the ocean to show you I remember life before the weight of bone, before the need for knives.