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MY GRANDMOTHER TELLS ME EVERYONE AROUND HER IS DYING
and that no one believes her. most days she keeps her heart
hoping someone might accidentally bump into it when reaching for
a knife. I wonder how long she has lived this way, like love, like
before dinner she sang a silent prayer to herself that was four beats long,
a sister, and a brother, and a cousin, and an uncle.
sad poems
happening
just because you iron out the wrinkles
it’s worn
I’m tired
too. but then she smiles and calls me
pats the kitchen counter like she’s searching
my grandmother tells me everyone around her is dying
I believe it. I see it
on the kitchen counter
the salt, or the pepper, or a fork, or
something that exists only because we tell it to.
I do not need to hear it to understand.
my grandmother tells me to stop writing
because isn’t there so much good
in my life? tells me
it doesn’t make it new again. once
it’s worn. and I wish I could tell her
of regurgitating my trauma
by the wrong name and
for something.
and I wish I could tell her
with my own eyes.
Mikayla is a rising Junior at Kenyon College majoring in English and Music. She edits for Sunset Press' poetry publications, as well as reads submissions for the Kenyon Review. She also really loves college radio.
Composition by Daniel Liu.
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