Friday, April 27, 2012

Adventure #6, "Try a Sonnet," she said: Ending with Bad Rhyme


The Last Stall on the Left

She scrapes her nail along her stretch marks
conscious his lips read between each line
those remnants of seed; warm water descending
vines that wind through rooms—a boy’s pail, a girl’s twine
a father’s bent boot, a mother’s worn coat
dirt and cold; sipped whiskey and warm coffee
words and teeth twisted with worry and toffee.
A hoarse whisper, lips (again) brushing her throat
like many before, words stick, withered to gasps
beside leaves turning brown then yellow
and those red letters, printed slowly, explain
bad decisions born of the bar, recalled in rasps
heard in bathroom stalls, reflected in Jell-O
shots, where fathers and then sons learn of pain.

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