LAZARUS
Unlike
a man it rose
— William Carlos Williams
She sucks the cigarette
that gives her lungs a burn, breathes
it out between the gap between
her svelte front teeth
the compacted grey
a snake escaping slithering away
from her face and dark, black hair
as she sits upon an old green bench
and watches a paper roll
across the street and down the road
until a tire squeals.
The paper’s brown, the size of man
and flattens beneath the car
until a wind whips it with life
to carry on again.
By the same author
Tampa at 8PM, Listening to a Podcast on Bird Migration
Woodlawn Cemetery lies shadowed beneath violet-bellied clouds