after Jenny Morgan
It’s not the water that’s taffy blue, but the floor and walls of the high school pool. I always forget this. “It’s a small world, but I wouldn’t want to paint it”—Steven Wright. I stare into the surface, but I’m barely there. A cat of some acquaintance peers back. She’s burping or meowing, trying to tell me something. I reach for a tuft of fur and come away with a chlorine hand. It’s right out of a gnawing dream. We’ve lived alongside animals for thousands of years. Only we wear swim caps.
Nate Logan is the author of Small Town (The Magnificent Field, 2021) and Inside the Golden Days of Missing You (Magic Helicopter Press, 2019). He teaches at Franklin College and Marian University.