~ Delta Poetry Review ~

Spencer Jewell

Hurricane Season

Early June, the scent of lilacs

is swept away by the storm like a soft-spoken

hymnal my momma thought Might just save us

this time. Sitting with my sister in the center

of Tennessee every Sunday night growing up,

I took what she gave me: sugar water and rose passion tea.

I took what she never offered, too, and made it my own–

turned theft into a ritual towards belonging.

Only small heists, I promise: a slow sip of a stranger’s whiskey.

The infestation of lily pads in his eyes. A bundle of twigs

and twine too weak to build a home. I thought I might be

anointed if I closed my eyes and sipped the remnants of spring

into my tired mouth slowly enough. I just wanted a touch,

and the promise of green. Momma taught me that love

is a strange and senseless country, and as much as I

believed her, it’s a land I thought I might’ve belonged to,

someday. Every month marks another failure to predict

my own weather—another journey back down the long road south,

stealing magnolias to let wilt and later sketch. I loom lullabies

from the earth in hopes that I might relearn how to fall

asleep sober. Find music in wild pastures and reclaim

the storm-spiraled wastelands I loved so much as a

little girl in the South. I took the instruments

Momma gave me, and all my life, I tried tirelessly

to recreate her music. Listen to the storms that

shelter and shadow me through every

landscape—always on time,

always in tune.

Spencer Jewell is a writer originally from Nashville, Tennessee. She is currently pursuing an undergraduate degree in creative writing in Bellingham, Washington, where she works as the poetry editor for her school’s literary magazine. She was a semi-finalist for the 2022 National Student Poets Program and received a National Silver Medal for her series of haikus. Her work has been published in Jeopardy Magazine and HamLit.