Doxology

Thanksgiving—
a word folks set on the table
like a covered dish,
and my tongue keeps finding pennies.

When my granddad died before dinner time—
like mashed taters sliding off the spoon—
we tried to patch the hole
with construction paper.

Handprint turkeys.
Little palms in orange paint,
feathers glued on crooked,
Elmer's dripped smiles on carpet—
while scissors flew to chew the edge.
While relatives muttered, how cute.

Like glue could hold a family in place.
Like grief can be trimmed
into a happy fun shape.

Yet the river kept running—
red-brown,
carrying the names
we don't say anymore.

Up on the Appalachian slope
a house glowed through bare branches,
porchlight calling moths—
and the closer we got
the more it pushed.

Magnetic hill makes the body screech,
lugnuts release; sparks panic,
like you're not welcome.

Scraping sting from the perspective of
a goat, uninvited by his mother—
on the holidays, déjà-vu, all over.

Just two deer
staring at headlights,
tryin' to make sense of the night.
The bloody coincidence in Inheritance.