
I Spend Two Nights Away from My Husband and Son
Walking down Walnut Street, I see the dine-in or takeout sign outside of the Asian fusion restaurant, a lotus flower drawn on in purple chalk. I think of my hunger the night before, how alone I wanted to be. The blue house turned bed & breakfast where I ate three strawberries on the floral-printed sofa, the ceiling arching above me like white knuckles folded in prayer. I was supposed to love this. I was supposed to know what to do with this. For a few more moments, I don't know anything— not the window showing off July in the city. Each rooftop its own horizon, orange as a streetlight. Not this desk. Not the many cars repeating themselves over the manhole like a click in the road. I pocket the silver key to my room, place my hand below a new rounded surface, bone making its own church inside me. Stained-glass windows like the color of fruit. This box of cookies my mother gave me sitting next to a miniature spoon. After she tells me to go look at the moon, (says it is magnificent), I make an X over my wrist. The mosquito in its place in the world. Like the half-drunk wine glasses left out on the deck, two people at one point where they needed to be— I like the way no one takes them away.