By Bridget Bell
Featured Art: “Red Table” by Jenn Powers

I am forever bending toward you like
the marigold starters packed onto
these plastic trays curve 

toward the windows. I save my SSRI
bottles. Pack them full of the papery
seeds from the deadheaded 

wasted petals, pulled off at their narrow necks and
even these stupid flowers
know they need warmth to survive. You say you are trying 

but when you pass through the
door arch—the one I’m leaning
into (as if to hold me up)— 

you do not brush against me so it feels like you
are lying, like you’ve passed through this tight
space, not only without touching me 

but with an avoidance of touch. I
turn the plastic trays so the
seedlings curve away 

from the sun—and tomorrow when I check
they will lean again toward the window—
all the back and forth 

buttresses their stems into strong green
spines, so I know they will be okay when
they are left outside and exposed for the
first time to all the brutal elements.

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Bridget Bell’s (she/her) poetry collection is All That We Ask of You Is to Always Be Happy (CavanKerry Press 2025). She teaches composition and literature at Durham Technical Community College, proofreads manuscripts for Four Way Books, and pours pints at Ponysaurus Brewery. bridgetbellpoetry.com