by Pell Williams

I am no good at waking.
Still, I borrow Momma’s
mud-worn shoes
and sip hot paper cup coffee
as her van fills one by one
with artists of all mediums.
I guard the van while they slip
under the Widgeon Point gate,
the night’s bruise healing with light.
I’m no good at sneaking
through the young pine forests
to peek at the easels tucked
into swathes of marsh grass.
No good at balancing on fallen
trees stretched over the pluff mud,
their bark so pale I cannot name them.
I am good at clutching close
this paper vessel and filling it
with tiny markings, at relinquishing
the song I sang when I first woke
in favor of thrumming insects,
birds reuniting after the long dark.
I’m good at holding position
on this log in the shadows
and watching orange rise up
purple palmetto trunks.
For every morning I cannot wake
I hope to God I’ll dream in sunrise.

Pell Williams received an MFA in poetry from the College of Charleston and a BA in writing seminars from Johns Hopkins University. Pell served as the creative writing editor for Surge: The Lowcountry Climate Magazine, and was the 2019 artist in residence for the Dry Tortugas National Park. She is currently a marine science writer for the State of South Carolina. Her work has been published in The Good Life Review, Birmingham Poetry Review, and Grim & Gilded, among others.