Surrender by Erin Wilson

lakeside again, no longer wanting to wait at the door,
the woman begins unlatching her earlobes and bra straps,

all of her mythed-out rememberings and imaginings,
steps out of her delicate skin with a flick of her toes,

lets down each book she's read and held in her milk glands,
sets out her turtle-slow sorrows to crawl off eternal,

unfastens her hair, murmur of blackbirds turned fast to fire,
and sends each cell off to simmer and simper

out over the surface of water.
the morning has called her this one last time,

and finally the woman has stopped trying to answer.

erin wilson's poems have recently appeared in Rust + Moth, Autumn Sky Poetry, and Up the Staircase Quarterly, among others. She writes, runs, and takes photographs in a small town in northern Ontario, where she sometimes encounters a wolf or two when crossing the bridge at night.