death

My daughter throws up once or twice a day opening mouth then hands as if to pour out what was once clenched. Throws up pillows, backpacks, and refrigerators. Builds a version of our cat from pretend vomit, builds a version of our kitchen. I worry

I can’t sooth her fears. It is terrible 

He was an Italian whom she had met a few days earlier at a bar. Now she was on the back of his motorcycle as they rode down Sunset Boulevard. She wore a black dress, black heels, and a black motorcycle jacket with a wine-red-colored lining.

What’s the thin break / inescapable, a sudden thud / on the porch, a phone / vibrating with panic on the nightstand?

Here’s a lesson: If you leave a hole in the forest, / leave a mouth open in pain, astonishment or grief, / something will come to fill it