Apart

the covers are the same leather, only Em dyed hers with pokenberries from the back yard, and i left mine dusty brown. the pages of her journal are inked over in love notes and sonnets and tearful lonely nights and dress designs & pieces of rose petal fall out everywhere and she clutches it close and it matters. mine smells like the print shop and is smudged and misspelled and i write about calving season and old man Huckers' new house and the first dandelions and last week's outrageous grocery bill. I marvel at Dante and Plath and Rice, and a world where hunger and happiness share the same sidewalk. my journal has words like "prodromic" and "palimpsest" underlined because there are so many more questions than why did you leave me alone?