Once
When we were children her hands pinched my arms like pliers.
Sometimes they were stones. Only once did her fingers linger lint-soft
upon my cheek. Now today in the nursing home she remembers
my name, not once, but twice as I whisper of the times she once spoke
without missed notes—ululation in spring, larynx vibrating with
joy as she ran with coyotes close enough to touch. The years her life
was carnal, addicted to cocks. Once loved a man. Loved a man.
Another man once. Sometimes kissed strangers. Girl on the edge. Tough
as bark, she danced around the rigor mortis of bodies lying on
autopsy tables. Was chemic fumes. Smudged fingers. Dreamt in dyes.
Said she had viewed almost all the ways to die, which made her
feel more alive. Collector of the macabre, she kept a two-headed fetus
lolling in a jar of formaldehyde on top of a bookcase. So many
trophies, knick-knacks during those years she chewed up the hours and
spent the future. Once, after a long night of drinking, she jumped
the line, flipping her car on its black back like a beetle. Blood corsaged.
The summer of marches and anti-war leaflets. A cop’s club mark
marring her forehead from those days she was smoke and a straight shot.
Good for a cup of bitter black coffee brewed with eggshells and salt.
The times she wore anger’s winter coat. Threw open doors. Cursed. Made
a mess of things. Spilled her milk again yesterday. Yesterday
spilled something closest to the bone. A single regret for unloving me.
Once self-exiled. Absented. Never once did we nestle like this.
So why am I here? To hold close her peach-soft, palsied hands.
Southern Indiana Review
Fall, 2019
