That Moment of Aunts, Cancer, and Stars

You know that moment of the crackle of gravel under your tires

like the crackle of stars

as you curve into your driveway,

windows low, portals that draw you out like peach paint into a sunset

the cicadas purring like shaken maracas,

the trees batting the sky like the taunt belly of a tambourine,

the radio sore in your throat,

and you hesitate with the universe, to watch the moon tuck the stars in for bed,

light stretching and retracting like the pleats of an accordion,

and your chest feels as though it is in rhythm with the song,

I know that moment too.

But do you know that moment, where once you step inside,

you overhear your mother on the phone

and she’s saying that your aunt has cancer,

that its stage four,

and your knees are like altar knees

and tongue like prayer tongues

but your thoughts like atheism

and the linoleum floor seems to be the only thing steady

in a chaotic universe of things that shake and people who break,

and you whisper into the lines of the floorboards that are too thin to be cracks,

“Why do bad things happen to good people?”,

but nobody whispers anything back,

and so you forget song and sunset and all that was once good

and you hesitate with the universe, to watch mortality tuck good people in for bed,

with a fitted sheet for a net and a pillow to thieve your breath,

and your chest has that lonely and raw feeling of a stone stuck in your shoe,

Yeah.

I know that moment too.

-anna sluder