ISSUE: Fall 2017
I dreamed of it again, my dad’s body lost to us again but finally
found again, we set him in Dickinson’s coffin, wooden, painted
white, where had his body been all these years, things felt strange,
I could see the stitches holding my dad’s eyelids shut, but lo
and behold his eyelashes, so long they tangled now and then, were
still intact, and at his throat, like Emily’s, a nosegay of violets,
a pink cypripedium, and two heliotropes in his hands, I loved
his hands, they were not large hands, they cut and sanded wood,
they had a fineness, a delicacy, it was said after Emily’s little nephew
died she became delicate, would not even let the doctor feel her
pulse, just walked past the door so he could diagnose her via
a brief glance, my mother and sister added bluebells to his coffin
but they called them sweet peas, I don’t know why, I don’t
know why I miss her so, and him, why die, why dream?
