Lori Bellamy
Personified
The old woman is here again
wearing her red pajamas.
She is talking rapidly,
holding herself up with her
elbows on two low canes.
There is a fence, she tells me, around a field
without sheep. No lambs kicking green.
No cows kissing grass. The earth eroded
so we see out the rift to the other side.
She is here alone, except
for me, sitting at the table
with an empty glass
in that shift from late to early
the sun rises
and throws a glare across the floor.
There is also a well that
stares back at the sky.
Echoes into you
when you sing down into it
when you try to fill it with song.
It is surprising how fast
she moves back into the other room
still talking,
calling out the names
of the newly dead.
—Submitted on 08/16/2020
Lori Bellamy is a math tutor living in Seattle.
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