Caitie Young
the tomato’s columella resembles the crucifix
the tomato’s columella resembles the crucifix
in my grandmother’s jewelry box surrounded
by a bright red spit moat like velvet,
I tell jokes at her death
bed and brush the fading browns
from her forehead, I cry and kiss the wrinkles
on her knuckles;
once, I had a hand so fragile and half her size,
once, I had a faith so wide it would have
been enough to turn her dying away,
once I was a woman and now I am nothing
and I laugh at my own jokes with a mouth so full of tears;
this is what she leaves me: all of her bibles
packed away now and ready for my perusal,
yet the only holy thing i’ve unlocked is my shame; I am too
scared to believe in anything smothered in blood,
how do I tell the dead I cannot breach these pages
or sow any more seeds?
at the last family reunion, looking over the bridge railing
at the last family reunion, looking over the bridge railing
white foam weaving through brown creek water
my mother says there were many a person who died
in those waters,
I want to ask whether this death is what she will leave me;
and what will I say to God
about the morphologic errors
that cultivate my ancestry of gender
and what of the only burden absent of bitterness in its bite—
yes, a life without knowledge of birthright or inheritance
will God call me daughter, son, or child?
Who were they, I can only wonder, the many people dead?
My mother wants to tell me about her mother
who planted red spider lilies beside blue hydrangeas
instead we stay silent while I imagine a world where
my mother’s mother gave her God so
my mother could swim through the creek water and in the foam
find the words for a story she could leave me
that wouldn’t drown me in the end
Caitie (Caid) L. Young (they/them) is a poet and essayist from Northeast Ohio, where they earned their MFA in Creative Writing from Kent State University and the NEOMFA Program. Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Puerto Del Sol, new words {press}, The Atlanta Review, The Sonora Review, The Minnesota Review, and elsewhere. Their work has recently earned a Best of the Net nomination, they were the first-place recipient of the 2022 Foothill Editors Prize for best graduate student poetry, and they are a pushcart nominee.