BLOOMSBURY TERM
In the ten-karat buff bray of English sun in late May, unquiet
Americans crack croquet behind the Georgian where we lodge,
the two of us upstairs in my bed where we’ve spent four months
splayed in an agar of chippie oil and cum, a post-Raphaelite
enfleurage. It’s all my fault. Endeared to his crude panegyrics
to my grace and ass in jeans, I’ve let this rush tow me
too far. My class weekend at Bath runs long, he waits in hysterics
with an engagement ring: in gold, a garotte and an engorged
heart. Forster’s a bore and college makes me a toff, he’s immune
to the perfume of hay and beeswax in the Royal Mews. Our Domesday
accounting, somewhere, is off. Hotspurs in extra time—what else
here is overdue? Hey nonny nonny, stay and say you’ll be his
alewife in a life ickle and mean. The fish in the fryer whisper, hiss:
Ophelia snuffed herself first with morphine.
AT THE ABORTION PROTEST
Venice, Florida, 1990
The host
is a white eye.
Belief means you don’t need
to see. But once
I watched the chalice
and the water went
pinkish. As if on cue.
There’s a sign
for me to hold. Mom
promises a Happy Meal
after we go. I don’t need
to tell her I want the prize.
I don’t want to be seen.
She says that’s just being
a preteen. Hooks
my elbow in hers.
Takes me where believers
line the street.
Cars beep. Women
scream. Agree
or disagree. Takes
a moment
to know. I don’t
want to see.
But once I pried
open an oyster
with my nail.
Something tiny and alive
broke there.
I don’t need eyes to see
Dad, Sunday mornings,
alone in his old robe.
Egg, toast.
He’s starting the cross-
word he’ll leave
for Mom to complete.
This we know.
Meg Kelleher is an English Literature Ph.D. dropout and a licensed clinical social worker writing in Chicago. This is her first publication.