8 May 2006 | Vol. 6, No. 1
The Beechwood Story
There is a mother that loves you
despite the sum of your parts.
She really is hefting gravel and gravel
just to heft gravel. These things
are true. The gravel is loaded into
the carriage while dogs snag legs
from the brush. Father is father.
The sisters laugh and point to a flower
and then to the pile of shit. "Someday,"
says mother, "This will all be yours."
The rain in Indiana is thick. The sky
gives up like the rest of us. "Mother,"
I have asked before and now again,
"Where to with these babies? Their
bellies are cold." Night is a curtain.
Our faces are the bough in the wind.
The family is scattered about the fire.
Burn some arm. A log from years ago.
About the author:
Formerly the fiction editor for Sycamore Review, Nicholas Reading is now an MFA poetry candidate at Virginia Commonwealth University. His poetry is forthcoming in the New Orleans Review, Sonora Review, and Zone 3.
For further reading:
See the complete list of work by Nicholas Reading at 42opus. Browse the contents of 42opus Vol. 6, No. 1, where "The Beechwood Story" ran on May 8, 2006. List other work with these same labels: poetry.
