I don’t look back over my shoulder
at the single grave
holding Ma and my little brother.
I am trying not to look back at anything.
Dust rises with each step,
there’s a greasy smell to the air.
On either side of the road are
the carcasses of jackrabbits, small birds, field mice,
stretching out into the distance.
My father stares out across his land,
empty but for a few withered stalks
like the tufts on an old man’s head.
I don’t know if he thinks more of Ma,
or the wheat that used to grow here.
There is barely a blade of grass
swaying in the stinging wind,
there are only these
lumps of flesh
that once were hands long enough to span octaves,
swinging at my sides.
and sit behind Arley Wanderdale’s house,
where no one can see me, and lean my head back,
and close my eyes,
and listen to Arley play.
August 1934