APERITIF | Madeline Lacques-Aranda
to quietly stand next to her, to wait for her free hand to absently pass over your hair.
to cool your small finger in her frosted glass, then suck it warm again.
to shyly smile and ask, “when is dinner?”
She might not answer.
She is with her husband.
Unwinding. It must mean the opposite
of soaking diapers, sorting lights from darks, folding eight different sizes of t-shirts, settling
fights, smacking the smart-alecks in the lonely world of day.
to see her chin tilt back, to watch the blue trail launch from between her scarlet lips, loosening as
it lowers into faint tendrils that settle around them in a private veil of haze.
to understand that it’s best to back out of the room, to close the door behind you, to join
the others in the bluer light of the crowded den. to know the answer: we will eat sometime after
Moe clunks Larry with Curly’s head.
In the oven ketchup forms a salty scab on the meatloaf. Someone has raided the olive jar to suck
the pimientos from the center.
The cold burn of her breath will smell of secrets.
We taste of them sometimes too.
to quietly stand next to her, to wait for her free hand to absently pass over your hair.
to cool your small finger in her frosted glass, then suck it warm again.
to shyly smile and ask, “when is dinner?”
She might not answer.
She is with her husband.
Unwinding. It must mean the opposite
of soaking diapers, sorting lights from darks, folding eight different sizes of t-shirts, settling
fights, smacking the smart-alecks in the lonely world of day.
to see her chin tilt back, to watch the blue trail launch from between her scarlet lips, loosening as
it lowers into faint tendrils that settle around them in a private veil of haze.
to understand that it’s best to back out of the room, to close the door behind you, to join
the others in the bluer light of the crowded den. to know the answer: we will eat sometime after
Moe clunks Larry with Curly’s head.
In the oven ketchup forms a salty scab on the meatloaf. Someone has raided the olive jar to suck
the pimientos from the center.
The cold burn of her breath will smell of secrets.
We taste of them sometimes too.