Death Scene to be Seen
A small group of women squat on the pavement,
heads dark and dejected, murmuring chorus
of smoking friends. Acting as signpost
for visitors unsure of the house number
funneled into a warm hug, then pointed
to the long concrete stairs that lead all the way up
to the murky middle of elderly pines
where I slip into her parents’ flat.
The shiva looks like a holiday gathering,
without decorations or wafts from the kitchen,
a tea and coffee party that goes in and out—
sunset slipped from the table
with supermarket shortbreads and cakes.
People who have known her all her life
compose the circle. I’m introduced to people
I’ve only imagined— I can’t take in
all their names, but maybe it’s enough
that they remind me of films I’ve watched
and their faces are so like the ones I’ve seen
and lost. We’re all in awe of death
and I know my face must look like that too.
Afraid to talk and yet I must talk to these strangers,
share and choke on their air, cloyed with pine and weed,
and dip their cardboard biscuits, rafts afloat.
I know I’ve kept aloof, call it privilege,
in my own world, not making new friends,
but lose one and it hurts like a cut tree
while I’m not the landscape. But pain needs soil,
earth opened and replanted.
Here’s her young son, snatching a hello
before ghosting off with a ladyfinger or two
to the TV room. He’s my student
and now I feel proud I’ve been keeping him
alive. Sort of. And then I’m in the surprising
grateful hug of the father. His cheeks are wet
and I’m pulled into the net and let go
from the centre of mourning.
~~~~~
Fiery Answer
Imagine God – Imagine God –
would have answered my prayers
I’d be too busy walking in the park at night
with ducks circling like semi-precious jewellery
chased knee-high by children, fed
white bread that they gorge, then choke on.
Let no one dare say We’re full.
God, where do they all come from?
Ducks taking a puddly dram, snatching bugs
between netted roots, slapping across the path,
righteous as strollers, unfazed
by splash or flash or a new moon.
Thou shalt not — a thunderous voice
from the bushes. My friend says it’s not a good idea
to walk alone in the park at night although
the path is lit by a cordon of lampposts.
I count another five women out in the wild.
One’s jogging, puffing vapour—
barely scrapes past the hyssop bushes.
I might spot the hedgehog near the pennyroyal
snuffling wood chips, underneath the pine trees
and rosehip, where ducks aren’t needed.
Jacqueline Schaalje (she/her) has published poetry and short fiction, in the Massachusetts Review, The Comstock Review, and Pembroke Magazine, among others. She was awarded the 2022 Florida Review Editor’s Prize and has been a finalist in a few other competitions.