Poetry By
Holly Day
Published on: 6/11/2012
Wednesday's Mail
Suddenly, I know what is in the package. It's another piece of child, sent to drive me crazy. The package is just the right size to hold either a bunch of little bits or one big piece, a torso, perhaps, a well-cushioned head. I gently pick the package up and put it in the spare bedroom with the rest of the packages the tiny finger-sized boxes the still-sealed shoeboxes concealing bare, uncalloused feet The rest of the mail sits waiting to be sorted through I flip through pizza coupons, form invitations to local beheadings, a flyer advertising the opening of a new Baptist church in my neighborhood. At the very bottom of the stack is a large manila envelope, thick with paperwork. I open it, curiously, not recognizing the handwriting, and watch in confusion as photographs of people I don't know pour out onto the floor.
Published on: 6/11/2012
The Clever People in My Bedroom
A man's voice in the other room speaks of impeaching the President as dust settles on the sill around my hand, making a perfect imprint on the termite-gnawed wood. I move my hand to look at the shadow left behind, the five thin lines that my fingers left behind, radiating like the spires of a crown around the thicker pulp of my hand. A woman's voice speaks now of the weather: fair with chance of rain later on, highs in the seventies for the rest of the week. "Now a word from our sponsors," a song about dish soap and deodorant.
Published on: 6/11/2012
The Spot
and all the while I was talking and singing to the spot I imagined the baby slept inside me, the reality was that the baby had died two weeks before, unknowingly, my husband had been sleeping with his hand over the tiny gravesite for a whole two weeks not knowing the body inside could no longer feel him my son had greeted me with a smile each morning with a kiss on that spot and "Good morning, Mommy! Good morning, Baby!" there was nothing there to hear his sweet happy voice all I know is that when the thing that once lived in that spot in my body refused my silent entreaties to have a heart beat, be alive for my too-quiet doctor, still waiting, couldn't have been more surprised couldn't have felt more cheated, could have just closed my eyes and died.
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