An excerpt from
In the Bones
Mother
Last night,
Her baby boy
Became a murderer.
He took a life so beautiful,
It looked like the dresses little girls
Wear to church on Easter morning,
With lace daisies all along their collars,
That made their mothers say,
“Look how sweet my girl looks.
Like an angel.”
He forgot
Who she was.
Like how she once drove
For twelve hours straight
From Washington, DC. to Florida
So he could ride Splash Mountain
And meet Donald Duck. He forgot
She has thirteen pictures
Of him hanging
All over her house
Because his smile was the only thing
She ever wanted to see.
Last night
Her baby boy
Took one of his father’s old ties
Red and black stripes
And slung it over the fan blade
Above his bed.
He jumped through the hoop
Like a lion at the circus,
Head-first.
When she found him
First thing in the morning
She saw he had written
on his palms, “Momma.
I love you.”
