Kristin Roedell

This winding hair,
that lives and breathes,
that you held in handfuls,
that you called my glory

is the first gift; it will lie close
on the top of water
with angling reeds,
fragile dragonfly limbs,
and floating summer seeds.

These white shoulders
That you lowered to the grass
That you held in handfuls.
That arched to meet your glory

is the second gift; they will
lie soft over the stones
beneath the water,
among the quiet stems of pond lilies,
and the darting minnows.

This throat, that pulsed with
your every sleeping breath
that you held in handfuls
to stifle every glory

is the last gift. It will
draw in the eddying water,
pull in the circling current
lie beneath the white
beech limbs.

Note: Ophelia in Reflection is an ekphrastic piece, taken from “Ophelia by the Pond”, by Jon William Waterhouse.