Apology in Advance


I tried to do it in one voice.

We've been over this before.

It was as orderly and complete
as my mother's cross-stitch sampler--
the Governor's Palace in colonial Williamsburg
and the whole goddamned alphabet--
framed by my father at the foot
of the staircase. As flat and even
as the layer of dust that collected
on the top of that frame, on top
of her glossy coffin's lid.

It made a sort of sense.

It was not this world.

- Dan Albergotti (from Connotation Press)

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