Manta rays wrangle
in tanks of ink, spider-webbed
ghost-crabs scrape the night-
scented street. The sea
this evening washes maps of
germplasm on its
banks. Intravenous
pumps beep and sputter, the glut
of white noise plunging
me underwater
where feral muses warble
over parasite
flights of silverfish.
Maybe they’ve kept me here hunched
and feral gnawing
on roots and bark in
a dark crook of their dream, as
I croon for all I
might lose. Memories
tangle in these brain coils,
Titian-red, teeming
with weeds that flay me
as I try to wade home. I
will not drink from the
stream of Lethe, its death
like ink laced with salt. Outside
the ICU sky-
light’s frosted sliver,
the moon stalks, nervy as an
onion. I chase
my pulse like a bone-
hungry ghost, my lungs purpled
over with drowning.
LeeAnn Olivier is the author of two chapbooks, Doom Loop Wonderland (The Hunger Press, 2021) and Spindle, My Spindle (Hermeneutic Chaos Press, 2016). A Louisiana native, Olivier teaches English at a college in Texas and lives with her partner Nathan and their three rescued pets. She is a survivor of domestic violence and breast cancer. Her poems in Rockvale Review focus on her recent experience approaching death and receiving an emergency liver transplant. She is very grateful to her donor and an incredible group of friends, colleagues, and family members who supported her during this ordeal.