Annalee Roustio

Tending a Miracle

Radically, the way radish transfigures the liver—
this is how I bring her back. With purpled light, 

variegating her sundress until the pleats blossom into iris
petals, her body into bulb, rendering her animate. Joyful. 

The baskets she wove fill with clean air and quiet,
violets, sweet cheese, rhubarb, arugula, and she eats 

where she can be nearest the beetles,
chin cradled in her hand iridescent with veins.

Her elbow is a pestle. Her mortar, the world.

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Annalee Roustio is a poet from the Midwest in the third year of her MFA at Southern Illinois University, where she teaches composition and assistant directs the writing center. She also works in marketing and publicity for Persea Books and as an editorial intern for Crab Orchard Review.