Anna Rankin

Commentary
Crosstalk

Crosstalk

“Orpheus hesitated beside the black river. With so much to look forward to he looked back.”

I drive north through darkening skies. Dim headlights diffuse a blue pallor over the sinking plains and pooling wetlands that glow in dusk. The car bends the coast before turning inland to ascend the thicket of pine that cuts across the dark island. Forest hedging the summit accedes to widening de- pressions in the land. Its recesses withhold rubbled secrets of a past that appear and recede without warning. I am driving into October.