“they are still there, can be again”

by Janna Grace

Try to sense the ghosts at your side—

trace the length of their disappearing spines

into windowpanes

alive only in the breath of frost

know their will to be again

can be yours when bed body

begins to rise, 

commandeer the impotent day

a cancer scare shouldn’t be

the only reason you watch the sea

creatures who spurt foam from blow

holes that populate your life

no,

know

night is the deepest ocean,

regenerate in its wintery grave

swim, lantern clad, among the snapped 

masts of shipwrecks, see

it is their will wrapping yours 

that hums in the wake you leave

beneath warming fingertips,

pull pulses through your shimmering 

shark skin—

electroreceptors are supernatural 

when you summon the ghosts,

sharpen 

your inherited claws.

Janna Grace is an autistic writer from New York. She has work published or forthcoming in The Bacopa Literary Review, Eunoia, and The Opiate, among others. Between teaching writing at Rutgers University, editing Lamplit Underground, and reading for Longleaf Review, she works as a freelance and travel writer. Her debut novel will be published through Quill Press in 2022 and her first micro-chapbook A Life in Times and Shells (Rinky Dink Press) was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.