I’m the one to hollow the pumpkin and carve a face.
The doorbell rings again. You adore the children
tonight in their costumes. A warm night.
We have no costumes, just the two of us
and the space between forming a shape we keep repeating.
My turn to go and hand out candy. We finally threw away
the photo from the booth that merged our faces,
a composite to show what a daughter of ours
might look like. She looked freaky not being real.
This isn’t yours alone to carry, isn’t your failure.
We won’t let us drift apart, but there’s nothing
to work on or figure out. With time you’ll say
your body doesn’t crave being a mother anymore.
You can’t say it now, your silence
a place into which I don’t know how to follow you.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 20, Issue 3.
Brian Satrom’s home is in Minneapolis, but he also lived in L.A. for many years, among other places, and completed an MFA at the University of Maryland. His poetry has appeared in journals like The Laurel Review, Poetry Northwest, MAYDAY Magazine, and TAB, the latter nominating his work for a Pushcart Prize. His book reviews have appeared in MAYDAY and on Colorado Review’s Center for Literary Publishing website.
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Allison Bird Treacy is a poet, essayist, and professional ghost, whose work grapples with issues of disabled embodiment and history, ecology, and the entanglement of both in myth and faith. Bird’s work has appeared in the Pittsburgh Poetry Review, VIDA, Buzzfeed, and elsewhere. She lives in the Pioneer Valley with her wife and too many cats.