Paradise
       

The last laugh's after the last
joke. Incoming graves. He
rode the train west to begin
a new job in Seattle while my
grandmother stayed with her
family in Boston to give birth
to my mother, and when she
arrived later, also by train,
but with children, she learned
that they lived in a distant,
rural suburb, and that he'd
told the neighbors that her
name was Kerry, who had
always been Muriel, and
Kerry is what she's called
today, this in my own family,
which I'd call without
hesitation feminist or progressive.
But no, we weren't paradise,
however it felt or looked.
Postholes punched in the dirt.
Paint on the patio. Is this
your story, the hurry in your
heart. The hearse we follow
will one day carry us home.

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Copyright © 2017 Andy Stallings All rights reserved
from Bennington Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission