Salamander
by Lana Bella

1. Here, smokestacks choked
2. soot to black, cleaved you to
3. shadow where the freight
4. train swept foghorns out to
5. sea. A pelican skipped bill
6. to crown on the pale of light,
7. storms shook out its beak;
8. fireflies discoursed through
9. rocks from each ship hewn-
10. tide.

1. Your salamander lungs ached,
2. turning you a fleeting silk of
3. liquidity over the trial flights
4. of logjam weeds, like asphalt
5. mouth hissed through calving
6. isles of memory, palpitating
7. tongue with slugs. Tonight, it
8. crossed your mind that this
9. gnarled ecology laying rutted
10. out in what darkness spared,
11. was your lips drawn back to
12. bare the teeth—exhaling snake
13. of steam.