Average Sustained Wind
by Katie Berger
Average Sustained Wind
To become a girl who lives in this wind requires prophecy--hair pulled tight before sunrise will lose its hairspray certainty. Wet new nail polish crumples and folds in on itself if you raise a hand to shield your eyes or ask a question about our founding fathers. Whole girls go missing and maybe she was killed but that doesn't happen in this weather. So likely the wind blew the three off her own door and now she's halfway to North Platte or the north pole. The missing person posters wouldn't stay stuck to the post office walls long anyway and the milk cartons would only drone with word jumbles and mazes. Your heart will stop beating before the windows stop rattling. You will spend summers combing straw fuzz bird nests and the feet of jungle gyms for lost neon friendship bracelets. Keep both feet on the earth while dancing at prom in a skirt. The wind will reveal everything.
Katie Berger
Katie Berger holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Alabama and currently lives in Nebraska, where she works as a success coach at Northeast Community College. She is the author of Time Travel: Theory and Practice, and Swans, both from Dancing Girl Press. Other works have appeared in Cherry Tree, Sugared Water, Pidgeonholes, Thimble, and others.