The Sandwich David Hepcott Enjoyed While His Mother Burned To Death In A House Fire
A single slice of ham lay with another of cheese, while the mustard raised a slight sting at the back of his throat. Halved diagonally, crust deftly sliced off; just the way he liked it.
We stood shivering, my Dad and I, shrunk
under enormous arctic air, watching
the source of all tears spin silk into the stars.
Homeward bound, this mote-borne traveller;
pilgrim after warmth and light, a shattered vase
with nothing to end its fall, spilling glass dust
into a darkness larger than the fever-dreams of God.
Four thousand years ago, it lit the night
and saw the Akkadians scattered like dolls,
a forest of flags tattered in the chalk of moonlight;
urus turning the pages of the ocean;
the hundred-year pharaoh narrowing
rheumatic eyes at the first clear gleam of bronze.
Separate ways.
You fall back into those millennia
You gave me your
paper heart yesterday and
i didn't mean to but it
ripped somehow and i think
it was because it was in my
pocket too long.
The rip isn't that bad it's
just where our hands
meet between your
galaxy and my
ocean, but i did go
to the store.
And i got some
scissors, tape, glue, and
even some construction
paper for a new one, just
in case it rips more. But
i'm trying to fix the half-
torn, lined, and wrinkled one
because i like
that one best.
But just in case it's
torn to pieces, i have
a back-up plan.
Cajun Boy
I came to be in the murky
depths of a forgotten bayou.
I learned to walk on cypress knees.
Mosquitoes tattooed flags on my flesh
staking their claim for one
insect empire or another.
I was weaned on swamp water gumbo
and fried things I can’t name
served over rice.
Tabasco flowed through my veins,
pumped by a zydeco heartbeat.
I learned to dance, barefoot,
on a long dirt road that stretched
between nowhere and nowhere
with a girl named Anna,
or was it Marie?
Maybe it was both.
I learned life’s secrets
from the blue heron and
wise whiskered catfish
and a bitch hound in heat
in grandpa’s dog run
