Amanda Deboer Bartlet
so i turn up at Lindsey’s after she’s already carried the tree home and
there it was in the corner, the branches still
stiff upward from being twined and
roped round so long.
the lights were strung on green wire, half of the bulbs burned out or
blinking as they wrapped back and
forth toward thewire star.
she opened a bag of ornaments: red, blue, silver; their paint chipped
from being crammed and rubbed up
against for eleven months.
we hooked and hung them in the spaces and
there it was, stiff in the corner
with half its lights burned out and us
staring into the tree looking to fill the places we missed.
we hooked the dead tree and it laughed back by
dropping dry needles on the silk skirt we dressed him in.
on the train home, a man with half his teeth out got into a conversation with the
girls across the aisle. the blonde’s earrings whipped her
in the cheek as she turned to
her friend. “he’s so mean!” she noted, then
whipped back to him, “why
are you so mean?” with an offended smile on her face.
he let out a dry holler of a laugh that rattled and dropped to the floor like a dead man’s last wish.
a cigarette dangled from the hole where his bottom
front teeth used to live and
there he was next to an empty chair talking
at two empty girls. “what the hell would I do with a cell phone? who
the fuck am I gonna call? My momma’s dead! My dad’s dead! my grandparent’s
are dead! what am I gonna do with a cell phone? if I found one I’d give it away!”
as he walked out, the door got stuck
open and there we all were, filling spaces
on the train somewhere between Bryn Mawr and
Sheridan, experiencing a short delay and
waiting for signals up ahead…
the blonde dropped some dry comments while the
operator fussed with the door trying to close the space and
move ahead to underground tunnels
on a fixed track to nowhere.
Amanda Deboer Bartlett
