Kelly Miller
We made love after my mother’s funeral. The orange stain of Doritos still on my fingers. I clawed his buttons. He tugged my nylons. Proving the cliché. Death like a good howling fight is an excellent aphrodisiac.
After, there was no remarkable point of sadness or regret. But there was a window blind tipped askew. And behind gathering clouds, a star that might have winked out long ago. Somewhere black umbrellas were opening, pushing rain.
The next morning I sprawled across a picnic table at the park. Thinking about my mother’s dentures. The day before she died. I was grimacing in the florescent backlash of the hospital mirror. Grimacing because the Poligrip I was applying would rot away with everything else. Her teeth clattering, unheard, against bare bones.
Nearby, a tall tree grumbled, cracked and fell. I looked around for another who might have witnessed. No one.
I saw you, I said, with as much reverence as I could muster.