Ash
Ash To put a cigarette between her fingers, just so, bring it to her lips and inhale, just so, launch smoke rings in the air, just so. What could be cooler than that? Then, she dips her finger in ash and draws clouds beneath her feet, a bridge of hearts to a big house, a tall spectacled spouse, a German Shepherd, awards, diplomas, and pictures of love under sheets soft as moss, of rainy Sunday mornings with pancakes, children barely out of dreams, sweet hot butter dripping from their mouths, New Year’s pajama parties with friends, a secret herb garden behind a rusty door. Beneath this blizzard of ash a husband examining her head with a stethoscope, declares her absurd. Her son lives and dies, dies and lives again, a gun smokes against a beloved forehead and the willow in the yard weeps sap. In her homeland a bird’s egg hatches a wolf, her childhood house coughs black smoke, and roads turn to dead-end alleys. 3 Then, she draws a lover, pours her dark curls like tar into his hands, feeds word fed to a locomotive bound for a place called away, and tells herself: this is exile. In the end, her face a map of ashen roads, she goes to the sink, lathers and rubs, slowly raises her chin to the mirror. 4 ...
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