For Sale
The story of this room can be told by
the couch and all the teenagers who dry
humped their way into adulthood here, making
out on its hard, flat cushions, more soft than
the floor, especially if you have not yet
realized your bones, still have that pliable
skeleton from childhood, all babies born
near sighted and gazing up into lights
too bright. The fireplace is a century
old, built for gas, now disabled, the tiles
separated from the concrete if you
press on them, the mantel not an antique,
held fast by only two screws, enough to
keep a baby from pulling it down. We
positioned the rug so no one sees the
stain from when the pipes burst, natural
dyes losing their boundaries when they’re flooded
by bathwater from the room above. None
of the pillows match, yet most are worn. This
is what happens when all go fishing but
me, this slow pacing between rooms filled with
ghosts: a great-grandmother in the wing-backed
chair, deaf and left out of conversations,
her primary chore to iron the hand
kerchiefs. I’m surrounded by the many
dead who sat in these chairs, and the drunk man
who always played the piano at the
parties, who on Christmas once wrapped his arms
and legs around a column holding up
the front porch, trying to bring the roof down.
Cliffs by the River
I am not sure about this Thanksgiving
turkey but have hopes for the exotic
Brussel sprouts still on the stalk, the smaller
second growth after initial harvest,
shipped to the type of grocery store I
prefer. Last night in Charleston, while I was
deciding which pie to serve, a sixty-
two-year-old white man shot a black teen who
bumped into him on the street. Or so says
the announcer on public radio,
still free if you can’t afford it, unlike
the public television station that
reaches us only though the cable, the
cliffs by the river blocking the signal.
Header image by Dai-Liv, "Paradero"