Mitigating Grief








MITIGATING GRIEF

My delusional strategies for dealing with the death of Magda: Speak only Tahitian because it has no word for grief. Smash the sun. Mandate flowers droop their heads. Ban plumage from peacocks. Bear into a mountain. Transubstantiate mezcal into Magda and drink her until I’m drunk. Fire her guardian angel for dereliction of duty. Sue God for wrongful death. Impeach Jesus to relinquish his treatise on resurrection. Fury down to Hades and steal Magda like some metrosexual Orpheus. Reverse time until Magda lives again. Do this by spinning the planet backwards. If this proves impossible, beseech Superman. If Superman says no, beg Andre The Giant to pretzel Death in his signature half-nelson-crotch-hold until Death cries uncle and surrenders Magda.

If all this fails, paint tears on my photographs. And hope someone deep inside me comes out to transfigure my shattering grief.






Magdalena, d. September, 2022.

"We shake with joy, we shake with grief. What a time these two have, housed as they are in the same body." - Mary Oliver













Mitigating Grief
Published:

Mitigating Grief

Published: