The Femur
When my ex Fed-Exed me a small box of her pubic hairs it ranked right up there among the strangest things I’d ever received in the mail. But the oddest was my grandfather’s femur. I was away at college when he passed. Shoved in front of a train by his third wife while visiting Berlin. My mother’s theory.
Then Dad decided to send along the package. When I opened it, I wasn’t quite certain if it was a joke. No note, no return address. Just the bone, suspended and fused inside a rectangular plastic frame, like a tarantula my kid sister had. I placed it on my dorm room closet shelf.
Through the years, and multiple moves later, I’d grown attached. It was as if we shared bone. Cartilage. Nerves. Connective tissues. It was what prompted me to pursue forensics, and I’d tote it, not an easy task, to my yoga classes, or to weekly seminars in Vegas. Cradle it at night, the smooth surface reassuring, hum ourselves to sleep.
After I got married, my wife begged me to get rid of it, wouldn’t listen when I pleaded with her to let it stay. She said it was too creepy. Really? What she doesn’t know is that I snuck it under the mattress, above the box spring on my side of our bed. And I can feel it, every time I lie down, growing.
&:
Leaving
Leaving: a cadence, a beat.
Repetition in our minds, lost and forgotten.
A shoe box empty and discarded. Painful, stumbling through, not around, this hurdle.
And still, caresses linger at the bottom of this bag of memories like a boulder.
Leaving: a door closes on feelings, darker out there. Blackness, but somehow enables me
to shine.
From this dark hallway I see roses in the moonlight.
The soft streetlight against the stars.
They have not forgotten me.
Upon leaving, a self-conscious, thwarted, last attempt to grasp a passing wave. Ride it to
the shore:
A failed attempt.
A deep sense of false pride. An aching troubled fit creeps along the path to the street.
The front yard screams at you.
And the car.
And the buttons on your shirt.
Leaving: Yes, I am leaving.
Still, you might have the chance to get there before me.
BASEMENTS:
The Bagpipe Refrain
The leafless avenue came crawling in the steamy dawn. Sun barely leaked between skyscrapers, and everything looked distorted: the signs appeared drooped, hanging at obtuse angles. Steam rising from street vents vaporous and ephemeral took shapes that reminded Doriece of spooky movies. Slashers. She shuddered. Why did I crash at Stan’s? I don’t even like him. Her cryptic thoughts rushed through her like toxins used to slay bacteria, and she spit. Her kidneys screamed for attention. Each crept step placed her closer to the E.R. Her mind thrummed the bagpipe refrain from her twin brother’s funeral that summer, though she tried to force it out. An “homage” to his military status. Fucking army. They’d stolen him, pilfered him from her. He was all she’d ever had.
With shaking fingers, Doriece buttoned the top of her jean jacket. The November wind sluiced through her heart. She stared into the swirling East River. Day by day just faded away, a rest to only keep her here.
