I. The nape of her neck hints at pushing me over a cliff’s edge. I am the quiet scream scraping through the air that dares touch her. Her cold shoulder shatters me into adoring stars in the night sky.

II. I’m convinced that she is brimming with lavender. I know this because I can smell each pale bud catch smoldering flame from the embers settled in her skull. The bone may look bone white, but it is blackened and fragrant within. Smoke curls — her eyelashes. Each dip of her eyelids burns a sizzling new freckle onto my cheek.

III. She finds that she feels safest when all the love notes are wedged between her vertebrae. I know this because she told me.

IV. We deliberately blinked at each other at the bottom of the pool. I could see the goldfish glowing in her chest, and wondered what she saw in mine. Then I remembered; then I opened my mouth and baubled breath rushed out to welcome water into the black emptiness. Then I remembered — she nurtures, and I neglect.

V. I lift her hair away from the nape of her neck.

 

 

 

 

 

Sarah Berg is an 18-year-old recent high school graduate and literature enthusiast who likes to call herself a poet. Her passions include competitive swimming, exploring Wikipedia, and the study of anatomy, but she likes poetry most of all.

 

Rachel Kertz was born in a small town in Missouri in 1988. While earning her degree at Southeast Missouri State University, she became interested in photography and began using her commutes as excuses to go on long drives through the rural countrysides, hoping to find locations and abandoned houses to photograph. She hopes to convey relatable stories in her images that speak to her audience on themes such as loneliness, love, exploration, and the feeling of being alone in unconventionally beautiful places. You can find more of her work on Flickr.