There is an alternative universe
by Clara Burghelea
where I can still taste my mother first thing in the morning,
a big truth kind of flavor. Ghosts for hire, whispers her mouth,
cysts to feel, the symmetry of a gift. I pause her favorite song
in the middle of the poem, the lump blinks back. I imagine it
an infant mouse, stretching its body thin to meet the light. Soon
a line of poppies waiting to be guided home. The calloused
underside of her palm over the noose of night, a fat tick
hanging in the air, moon, an avocado yielding to my grip.
