Tag: death

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Untainted Memories by Kenzie Busekist

Gingerbread Wind Chimes

When we walked into the unfamiliar building I was confused. I was told we were going to see Mom but I didn’t understand why she was in this unfamiliar place when she could be in her bed at home. My stomach grumbled. I wished Mom was making fried chicken for dinner. Instead, we are in this dreary building going to visit her. It doesn’t help that it’s Christmas Eve. All these cheery decorations don’t belong here. There’s an odd stench that fills the halls. It smells like stinky feet and sadness. We turn the corner and I see her in a bed across the hall. The covers outline the silhouettes of her bony arms. She lies there perfectly still. The only sign of life is her bloated stomach moving up and down. Continue reading “Untainted Memories by Kenzie Busekist”

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Two Bad Things by Nora Balboa

When my childhood dog died, I cried for three days.  During those three days, I probably slept a total of six hours.  I was nineteen years old at the time and had gotten that dog—Princess—when I was three years old.  I was devasted.  I could tell you exactly what I was doing the day that she died.  I could tell you that I had on my high school English honor society shirt.  I could tell you that it was roughly 9:40 pm when I let her outside and her legs stopped working.  I could tell you that when the vet told us it was time he was wearing green scrubs and that when she tried to look up at me for the last time as she went to sleep there was one brown spot in the white of her left eye.

When my grandpa died two months later, all I remember is that when my mom called me from the hospital and told me in a tear-choked voice that Grandpa was gone, I said, “Oh.” Continue reading “Two Bad Things by Nora Balboa”

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Elegy for Full Caskets by Matthew Musacchio

when i am to die, because there is no if in the matter,

whether it be two days or two hundred years,

may it be on this ground or out in technicolor stars

like bars on the rhythm of this mortal coil

where i am to return to the earth or the sky

or to whatever god has hold of the chain

around my neck giving me such

terrible mercies as to break it

snap it.

when i am to die, do not bury me in this sweet mother

the soft dark soil that is the bosom of Gaia proper,

improper to profane such beauty, such grace,

think of each and every lover we leave behind,

dont make them fall on our caskets

reaching once more tugging at our necks;

think of the pain a eulogy would bring

no, i wont do it i wont knowingly do it

so if you read in newsprint memoria

“they were loved and remembered, service at-“

fuck that, know that i wouldn’t want to lie

sallow in dark suit pinned by carnation and

why couldn’t they at least be roses

rising and falling on wailing chests

please, i beg,

If one person sees me in that suit

surrounded by pine, opining that i

left too young

it wasn’t my design

know that i wanted my heart strings plucked

placed in an urn

and wrapped in the velvet of this poem

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Hugh Hefner Laid to Rest Next to Marilyn Monroe in Private Ceremony by Kate Gorden

“I’m a believer in things symbolic,” he said. “Spending eternity next to Marilyn is too sweet to pass up.”

Many admirers of the late celebrity gathered

to pay respect to a sexual icon, a man

of such prestige and prowess to shame

Zeus. Ravenous.

A few flecks of white blemish the pure

blue sky, but there is no threat of

rain – he would not want any of the funeral guests

to weep for him, and so the sky complies.

 

Today, Hefner merges in eternity alongside

the blonde that never became a rabbit. The Helen

about whom thousands of magazines were printed.

Her face is the muse of many, her body

the model of countless fantasy. Her mind a broken

cog in the otherwise ideal product.

Her voice a painting of the Madonna.

Her soul the lord of the abyss

he did not foresee.

 

They join together in their stone wedding

bed, pomegranate seeds strewn

across the sheets that drove her

into the depths of damnation. Seeds fed to her

in life by her new bedmate and leagues of others.

Poison hidden behind sweet devotion. She swallowed

them whole, naked. Just how they wanted her.

Just how he liked her. Silent.

She complied because she had no voice.

 

In the kingdom of the dead,

Marilyn speaks.

And as Hugh enters Hades, he does not

enjoy Persephone’s fate.

She makes sure of it…

 

Rather, that is what I tell myself.

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Grief: An Afterthought by Kenzie Busekist

His name was Austin Koehler. His hair was stringy and blond. He was the type of boy that was constantly dirty. It was fair to assume that his mom didn’t make him take as many showers as mine did. He was continuously on the go, always outside, just ready to explore whatever piqued his interest.

Austin was my next-door neighbor and neither of our backyards had fences, so he would always stroll over to mine. It was pretty obvious who had the better yard, because mine was home to a gigantic play set that had chain-linked swings and a bright yellow slide. Needless to say, he was over constantly—so much so that from time to time my parents would complain about his lack of parental supervision. I didn’t mind Austin being over all the time. He played the big brother role and showed me all of the things that I needed to learn in order to be a kid growing up on the south side of Lincoln, Nebraska. He showed me how to climb large piles of dirt and how to pump my legs back to get the momentum that allowed me to swing higher. Continue reading “Grief: An Afterthought by Kenzie Busekist”