There Are No Honest Poems About Dead Women

What do we want from each other

after we have told our stories

do we want

to be healeddo we want

mossy quiet stealing over our scars

do we want

the powerful unfrightening sister

who will make the pain go away

mother’s voicein the hallway

you’ve done it right

the first timedarling

you will never need

to do it again.

Thunder grumbles on the horizon

I buy time with another story

a pale blister of air

cadences of dead flesh

obscure the vowels.