Bed

 

belongs to silvered heads.  Threadbare pillows,

pilled bedspread meager enough to expose

the forty calcified overgrown toe-

nails near its dinged footboard of those reposed

in perpetuity.  Four ninety-year-

olds who soon will be eleven again

this evening when the grandson appears.

Chocolate whispers sate hungry ears. Thin

crinkled lips one licks to tell a story, sort

of, too, a spell — muffles a noisy gut,

arthritic pain, unhinges jaw, transports

them from what inane starvation abuts

two rooms seven share, a communal bed.

Chocolate incantations raise the dead.

 

Kristin Garth is a Pushcart, Best of the Net & Rhysling nominated sonnet stalker. Her sonnets have stalked journals like Glass, Yes, Five:2:One, Luna Luna and more. She is the author of sixteen books of poetry including Pink Plastic House  (Maverick Duck Press), Crow Carriage (The Hedgehog Poetry Press), Flutter: Southern Gothic Fever Dream (TwistiT Press), The Meadow (APEP Publications) and Golden Ticket forthcoming from Roaring Junior Press.  She is the founder of Pink Plastic House a tiny journal and co-founder of Performance Anxiety, an online poetry reading series. Follow her on Twitter:  (@lolaandjolie) and her website kristingarth.com