Genesis Again

Genesis Again

Audrey Elledge

The same day you glazed pools of clotted oil
on your chest and thighs and stretched long across
the summer grass like a crawfish for boil,
a snake bellied its way in, striped green floss
weaving toward you in low, lonely haste.
Dad and brother came with golf club and rake—
cartoon armor—and Mom clutched her wet waist,
towel and robe pulled taut to attend the wake.
Later, you will cloak the tale with danger,
how he curled the dry earth beside your head—
forked tongue and Eden-eyes—but what’s stranger
is all four of you there, together, fed
by the shared hope of bloodlust, by the gift
of tethered lives facing death, sure and swift.

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Audrey Elledge
Author & Editor

Audrey is an writer and editor in New York, where she works by day at SparkNotes. She has won the Academy of American Poets Prize and the Virginia Beall Ball Prize. Audrey co-authored two books, Liturgies for Hope and Liturgies for Wholeness (WaterBrook), with Elizabeth Moore.

Photography by Mahmud Kara