A green frog on the bank,
and we just watch. 

Everyone knows this
from cartoons and/or

being outside: the leap
is a single, swift, arc

from right there at our feet
to somewhere else

we don’t even know.
It happens when we get

too close. If we’re lucky, 
if the water 

is clear enough,
if the light is right, 

we can see the creature
that lives in both worlds

living in the other now,
and the single kick that

flicks it from one side
of our vision to

the other. Everyone
knows about the land

and water deal, 
but amphibian also means

of doubtful nature. 
Were we made

for both worlds?
It’s good we started

with just watching, ok
that we’re fuck-all to the frog, 

the one that haunts stone,
and a miracle

that we manage to track
its flight through the stream

because—God!—it gets
so far away so fast. 

---

Andy Fogle is poetry editor of Salvation South, and author of Mother Countries, Across From Now, and the forthcoming Telekinesis, collaborations with Hope LeGro (Ghost City). He’s from Virginia Beach, spent years in the D.C. area, and now lives with his family in upstate New York, teaching high school.