Ashley Anna McHugh

for John Fogleman There are some things we just don’t talk about— Not even in the morning, when we’re waking, When your calloused fingers tentatively walk The slope of my waist: How love’s a rust-worn boat, Abandoned at the dock—and who could doubt Waves lick their teeth, eyeing its hull? We’re taking Our wreckage as a promise, so we don’t talk. We wet the tired oars, tide drawing us out. We understand there’s nothing to be said. Both of us know the dangers of this sea, Warned by the tide-worn driftwood of our pasts—. But we’ve already strayed from the harbor. We thread A slow wake though the water—then silently, We start to row, and will for as long as this lasts.

Eventually, I grab the back-door key from the cup-holder, slip a folded list into my pocket. Inside, I dig through closets to find the lincoln logs, the cardinal statue, the clock shaped like an elephant, a kettle— but the whole time I half expect to hear her: the careful shuffle of her slow, flat feet; her walker's unpredictable clap; her voice trembling with evangelical vibrato. Beside the bed, I find a King James Bible, her careful marginalia penciled in: Glory! Glory! Amen! I set it down. I shouldn't want it just because it's hers.

Tell us how the soul is bound and bent into these knots, and whether any ever frees itself from such imprisonment. —Canto XII, Inferno I say,Without a God there is no hell. There’s only this—. She rustles for her keys. The apple tree sheds petal after petal. She says,Let’s take you to the hospital. The petals spin like sparks. I close my eyes and say,Without a God there is no hell, and there is only this. It’s just as well. The lawn is red and white. She asks,Who says? How do you know? The wind fells every petal. She says,Let’s take you to the hospital. I cannot breathe. I cannot tell her,Yes—. Because without a God there is no hell, as she whispers,Talk to me, I know I will clamber—but not toward heaven, toward the sky, eyes winking behind petal after petal. The rope-burnt bark will flake away and fall. Knot on my neck, the rest would be so easy: I’ll pray,Without a God there is no hell, then slip through petals—through petal after petal.