Laurie Rosenblatt
It's one of those days when pollen, dumb as any lovelorn thing, lavishly drapes itself over my vintage Suicidal Tendencies T-shirt and because the world is beautiful I poke around with strangers unlatching gates and sort of hoping they'll notice the greenish-yellow dust on my shoulders and think, Wow, that's an awesome case of dandruff! Then it hits me. I've forgotten how to spell cemetery. This is an ordinary afternoon in spring, so leaves play on the sod as if water-dimmed fish ease to-and-fro. In conditions like these, grief can't resist the occasional ambush, leaping from thickets too spindly it seems to hide anything at all. And the shock happens yet again when I spot greyish pits in limestone filled with splotches of lichen implying someone-in-particular's face. I should say here that I'm one of those people who too often wakes up dry-lipped from kissing symbiotic pairings of fungus and algae. Thus, is it really a wonder that I have once or thrice given chase to an old sonnet that goes on about reckless joy stored on a memory-stick? Only a fool gets taken in that easily though. On the other hand, there's all this body-din to deafen a soul who as a result gets sucked up into a whirlwind of frustrated lust just like Dante's Francesca before I crump into rage or sorrow. That's why, since the husband is dead, I tool around in places like this checking out the promising dirt.