You do not want to be here

 

Your bitterness,

like a shawl

wrapped loosely

slips off my shoulders like silk.

No matter how many times

I gather you up in my arms,

you do not want to be here.

 

I can see your bitterness,

the same vacant look

in Grandmother’s eyes

before she died—

here but not here

there but not there,

cursing that liminal space.

 

I can hear your bitterness,

lightning silenced by

the opaque clouds

of forged laughter—

a serpent

constricted by etiquette and religion,

 

shedding through cracks in the wall,

bitterness curdled in your veins.

 

Shawn R. Jones