After After
       

This was after we moved into pencil drawings of tree houses on stilts, but before the cows grazed in the diminishing field of the freckle signifying our face.

This was after a refusal of berries too close to rotting, but before self-consciousness about metaphor.

This was after the butter-soaked collard greens, but before we deflated the ache as if it were something reusable and easily stowed.

This was after the pimple you mistook for jam and, obviously, failed to wipe off, but before the last comma, which we obstinately misplaced.

This was after the bite mark, but before the tongue.

This was after the nosegay protecting the nose from the plague-stench, but before the video of the autopsy of the woman with a bra and panties matching your own.

This was after lushness, but before lushness.

This was after the ghosts caught fire and after their flimsy collage of light, but before the building conceived space and before the hard labor and before the dead men.

This was after the green shoe busted and the wool shoe, but before the description of a bus-struck owl.

This was after we knew, but long before saying.

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Copyright © 2020 Kristi Maxwell All rights reserved
from My My
Saturnalia Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission