‘Then a little accident, Those Bits of You Falling Out of Box’

Photographer Rachael Drake is a fiction writer and poet based in New York whose work blends the literary and the speculative, often exploring solitude, belonging, and the unseen forces that shape us

Then a little accident, Those Bits of You Falling Out of Box

You could not be contained.
First, tipping from your wooden urn
into the backpack I inherited.

Then blowing everywhere—
in hair, on pants,
on sea rocks.

After scatter
I took a taste of you.
You melted on my tongue, like a salty snowflake.

There were so many places I wanted to be with you.
Now I bring your backpack for travel—
bits of you: bone to ash to wood

to plastic vinyl. I carry you,
your dust, with me this way.
You could not stay central to that sea inlet.

Your constant friends, the winds, the currents.
Will I find you when I want another taste?
The decision to be there—

at Clover Point—both of us.
When you showed me, I said,
I'd like to be scattered here.

You bringing me to that windy watergrave.
A view we shared through cells. Psychic boy.
You were foretelling checkpoint failures.

Parts will travel on that Pacific.
Communal.
In water—on a craft-less cruise.

You, your grandfather—
there you both are in the ocean,
obligate resprouters

regenerating
in the
undertow

J. Dylan Yates holds a BFA from the University of Colorado-Boulder. Her work includes the award-winning novel, THE BELIEF IN Angels. Dylan’s poetry has appeared in numerous anthologies, including Grief Like Yours: A Story Collection of Life After Loss, A Year in Ink, Volume 10, and Moonstone Arts’ 30th Edition of Poetry Ink. Her poetry has been published in national and regional anthologies and newspapers. Her newest poetry publication, Ghost Composer, will be published in May 2026.