Family Plot

Wind-scoured in fallow land,
bone-orchard sheltered
in the airplane’s shadow,
its incorporated space: a safe
place to be dead. The car
upturned on Barry Road.
Barbara in the hospital, Becky
at the stove, stirring the hollowed
house full of pepper smell.
Through a veil of dust the rare
truck treads up, the morning
fox’s muzzle frets a footprint,
the scent we leave there,
the headstone’s lamb’s
prayer, thaw and thistle
bristling at the cemetery border.

Stefanie Wortman
“Family Plot” first appeared in Subtropics 8 (2009).