Leanne Hoppe

 

West

I move myself by moving
my body. You’re not used
to these landscapes:

the moon as source,
not shadow, not mirror.

Hollow barks suited
to something larger.

Something between desert
and canyon, landscape
indeterminable, unprompted.

And you’ve not died.
Just become others:

the cook at Tee-Pee Drive-In,
my boyfriend at 2 p.m.,

the child whose fallen
behind her parents,

too short or too slow,
but not forgotten.
This is my pilgrimage:

to discover you
in the entirety of your roles,

to catalog not country
but characters.
 

Leanne Hoppe holds an MFA in poetry from Boston University and works as a teacher, editor, and translator in Cleveland. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Palooka Magazine, Bayou Magazine, Gravel, Asymptote, and elsewhere.