Springtime

Spring is dizzy; it salivates. You know how this has gone,
will go. The mulch, the acrid honeysuckle, the girls and boys

daubed with pheromones. Even the nose hairs flinch
in excitement. But a sweet joy comes when I eat an avocado

alone in the kitchen, and the breeze blows past me through the open
window, a sheet passing softly across an arm. We’re all being

reupholstered. You with me. Me with this sheen
of hot sweat. I’m munching on the fruits of your labor, the neurons

in my head. The lakes are full now, robust. The trees fill in
like hair. Your intentions are wide like arms, or roots, or

bad ideas. I hold the corona of the sun in my mouth. As I write this,
May arrives. And yes, come to think of it, everything is wide:

the silence that hangs around the lone metal chime.

Kristen Steenbeeke is an alumna of the University of Washington creative writing program, where she was runner-up for the Charlotte Paul Reese prize for fiction. Her work is forthcoming in Mare Nostrum. She currently works at the Richard Hugo House, a literary arts center in Seattle, and has a cat named David whose name is an amalgamation of all great writers named David.