Sundays, we’d glide
over the just-iced canals,
warily eyeing the dark patches.
Often several of us
stopped, sensing danger
began to assess
the crossing
and found you
ten paces over it, merrily
looping the slick ribbon.
I never caught you
in the act of leaping.
Even in life
you were so far
ahead, as if
that thin, wavering skin
of glass, that near abyss
was less death than detail
just enough blade
to sling
your reflection
like rope
body answering through.
— by Jenna Funkhouser
