In the kitchen of a friend of a friend, we’re all leaning
against appliances and talking—this is a stop on the
artist’s studio tour—did you see the pastels in the
other room, we ask—how about this November weather,
we say and somewhere in the conversation a pair of us
discover ourselves widows newly into year three—
still astonished by the places those years have taken us—
How about that first year? we say—like we’re talking
about a snow storm or a baseball season—how about
that year when grief escaped to run like electricity
across our skin, the year of gifts discovered inside
the sorrow—Did you fall in love all over again?
we ask each other—and was the radio dial in your
head tuned to play only fragments of love songs?
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 26, Issue 4.
Stephanie Coyne DeGhett is a writer of fiction, poetry and essays. Her novellas and short stories have appeared in Southern Humanities Review and The Missouri Review, among other places. Her essays have appeared in South Carolina Review and Writer’s Chronicle. Her poetry has appeared in a number of journals, including New England Review and Spoon River Poetry Review. She teaches in the BFA creative writing program at a small liberal and performing arts college.
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