Andrea Uptmor is a writer living in Minneapolis.
When K Gets Home
The cat has been dead
for hours, coiled tidily
on the tufted rug
where he spent his slow
and deliberate afternoons.
Oh, dampness. His golden
fur, his pulpy toes.
You wonder: Has K seen?
No. Not yet. She is aflush
with carnal magic, grating
with one toenail an itch
on the meaty center of her calf.
The hallway mirror paints a portrait
of heronesque grace, thick
pleasure: tongue
resting upon its lower
lip like a slug.
How beautiful, she mouths
and rakes, to have
this kind of accidental
pleasure in life.
Such as last summer
when the garden opened
itself to my feet
like the sinking back
of a lover. That reddest tomato.
Wind that smelled of lake. Me
chewing like a child, seeds blessing
my chin in their phlegmy juice.
Eating as if I had not just crashed
the car into the garage. As if
I had not panicked at the sound
of peeling metal, nor
braked mid-scrape, nor held
the seatbelt between my teeth and cried
at the damage of reversing;
the cost of moving forward. Grief
loomed either way, and yet.
That red tomato still awaits, that
spongy earth beneath.
How curious, she
murmurs, the moments
that press upon you
with such urgency
that you wear them
from then on like a cape. May
we all be wrapped
in them forever.