by Hillary Kobernick
When we got to Lake Michigan
I intended to jump in, ice included.
Or at least strip boots and wool socks
and dip my toes in.
This is how I imagined the new year
beginning, crawling like all evolutions
from the bottoms of water.
It’s what I think about all four hours
that I drive and you talk.
By the time the trees swallowed us
and the night offered a hand—
it was all dark and we could hear the water
but couldn’t tell where it the surf began
and the mud ended. I wanted to be clean.
Instead, we fucked.
I never washed the old year off.
Just slathered the new one on top.
Hillary Kobernick writes poems for both performance and page. She has competed at the National Poetry Slam six times, representing Atlanta and Chicago. She holds a Master’s of Divinity and currently pastors outside of Chicago. Her poems have been featured on Button Poetry’s YouTube Channel and are published or forthcoming in journals including DecomP, Hermeneutic Chaos Literary Journal, Stonecoast Review, and The Christian Century.
Hawaii Pacific Review 