Riley Hines
Death is always better received
in mid-summer when mayflies hatch
from their coiled cocoons.
The births of deer pollute the air
with a new musk—that sweet smell of
wet fur and big, glassy eyes.
Death is foreign here, but not
ill-received. He comes with the cicadas
to the front porches of nursing homes.
He glides through the cracks in car windows
and, sucking the life dry as if it were a low-hanging plum, leaves
when he is full.
But in wintertime, that cavern that
sinks into Earth’s fabric with clouded mornings
and ink black nights, Death is
always, always, always, hungry.
He spreads his arms wide as the once-green creatures
shy away in sickness and thirst,
their rooty throats coated in snow and dust.
Death is a constant dinner-guest at winter’s door,
and here he grows insatiable and wild,
killing, killing, killing until all branches are dry and brittle
and all roads are slick with ice.
Death cannot consume enough of Himself, in
this the beginning of a new year, the old
sloughing away like dead skin and
sinking with frozen fish beneath a solid river.
We must wait for summer to return,
for the heat and fire-smoke to lull Him
into a desirable party-guest once more.
Here we wait, wait for Him to take what He must
from the banquet table of Life, praying that
he doesn’t take more than his fair share.
***
Riley Hines is a graduating senior at the University of Alabama. She loves all things fantasy, but is also drawn to horrific themes that make one’s skin crawl. Two of her poems can be found in Issue 30 of the Marr’s Field Journal.