To Erase a Whisper

you can still love someone when you’re drowning in salt water
it’s the lilac in tides           the way she traces her fingers over your

bare shoulders      it’s the velocity of color changing while
you sink, first cumulus, then pretending to be the red cliffs past

your house          or maybe it’s the contour of her posture before
night’s sleep that keeps your arm around her waist      you

can never take that back      not while the water enters your
lungs      not when the warm skin of her back waits for the tip

of your tongue      you like to explore the colder areas like hailstorms
only           they become stones at the bottom of the sea you wait

there because you love the darkness, it encourages you to
rearrange the webs spread across the bed where she lies.

Monty Little is from Tuba City in the Navajo Nation.  He is of the Salt Clan, born for the Manygoats clan.  A student at the Institute of American Indian Arts, majoring in both studio arts and creative writing, Monty is a recipient of the  Truman Capote Scholarship.