We Both Lose Words by Vera Kewes Salter

I push something square
into a silver machine

and eat it for breakfast. White
emptiness where the words should be.

He supplies the word toaster.
I kneel to tighten his shoes.

As we walk around the park
we struggle to find the word

for a water bird with a snake-like neck
that dips its head below the surface.

We see a lone sailboat moored near
the winter shore,

watch gulls crack clams and mussels
on the asphalt pier.

Then, in sudden unison shout—
cormorant.



Vera Kewes Salter is aging with her husband in New Rochelle, New York. She is published in Red Eft Review, Persimmon Tree, Nixes Mate Review, Writing in a Woman's Voice, New Verse News and other publications.