How might I kayak my body
into the flow that empties into the ocean,
live in the lives of all things that cover earth;
to bloom as flower, to leaf on a bough?
To have no thought but the feel
of water expanding me until, I, too,
flow downstream, present
as all things are that are uniquely existent.
O, expansion, you are not a circus,
but you are the water I was first baptized with.
Dianna Henning, MFA, has been published in the Moth, Sukoon, Mojave River Review, and elsewhere. Her third book of poetry is Cathedral of the Hand (Finishing Line Press, 2016). She has taught through California Poets in the Schools and the William James Association’s Prison Arts Project. She has received several California Arts Council grants, is a three-time Pushcart nominee, and runs the Thompson Peak Writers’ Workshop.