They Hold
A tree with white blossoms,
Maybe dogwood or witch-hazel,
Stands stark against the bleak gray cliff
And the soft green of fresh leaves.
Growing horizontally from the ground,
Holding itself against gravity
Roots straining from the weight
Of the sky.
​
But they hold.
Teddy Bear
My mom woke me up.
I had been sleeping
while my family gathered
waiting for my grandmother to die.
It had been a week
since she had fallen into a coma,
and we had set up
a hospital bed
in our living room.
We had promised her she would die at home.
Earlier that day we circled around
her unmoving body
and sang hymns.
I’ll fly away,
Oh Glory,
I’ll fly away
in the morning.
She died in the evening
and it was several hours
before we called the coroner's office.
We sat in the room with her body
and talked about the woman she was
before and after the dementia.
When they took her body away
we took the stuffed animals we had
surrounded her while she slept.
The last of her warmth
was in the teddy bear
held to her chest.
Dishes in the Night
When I can’t sleep, I do the dishes.
I stand with the water running
and scrub the scum
from the bowels and cups
and listen to podcasts.
I keep it quiet,
a bare murmur in the silence of the night
because my roommate sleeps
and the walls are thin.
I learn about history
from scholars I will never meet
and listen to people talk about books
that I read many years ago.
I travel to a small desert town
filled with the bizarre
and to an Appalachia
terrorized by old gods.
I stand in my bare feet
on cold tile floor
with warm, soapy water
covering my hands.