When the sun drips under
the mud, I dive up. Dusk
to dawn, baby. I know
what it is to wait
all night, to hold
heat in my throat
like a secret. I wish
I could play it for you, the night
sounds cloaked in thunder
and the bat wing’s swish. I’ve heard
frog is the term
for the bottom of a violin
bow. Make music
with me, I’m waiting.
Emma DePanise’s poems are forthcoming or have appeared recently in journals such as River Styx, The Minnesota Review, Reed Magazine, Passages North, The National Poetry Review, and elsewhere. She is a winner of a 2019 AWP Intro Journals Award and the 2018 winner of the Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry. She is currently a PhD student in English at the University of Missouri.