A dead poet writing about a dead love reminds me of roses on a casket as a minster plants prayers in the rain, only for

a true love letter: no passion pressing against margins, nor metaphors gone crazy outside the predictability of a love poem, their name not signed with

Thunder droned in the background like someone used to luckless love, while my son splashed in puddles, far removed from concerns that grew up next

My grandmother bootlegged liquor after her first husband died, and she drank beer at her kitchen table instead of Sunday tea, trying to forget the