red booth
review

I imagine you in the pubs:  
wide lapelled suits, 
pant legs falling around your shoes, 

accent thick as your dark hair, 
carrying a black and white of Mama.
 
I went to your funeral,
bangs cut straight, new dress.
Mama said your family had to see I was cared for,
your sister checked my underwear for holes.

Flowers and flags, tears, 
incense and chanting.  
I threw up in the car on the way to Pinelawn, 
you rode in a box just ahead.

I returned to second-grade, 
the day before Halloween,
to boys in skeleton costumes.

Mama cried, barely spoke for a year,
lighting candles near a make-shift altar.

When she wasn’t looking, 
I’d sniff your overcoats,
and put my hands in the pockets.

 - Penny Freeland