Fatally, noodles congeal to the formica
slip she saves for special occasions.
Fatally, she screams, drags fistfuls
of brown shag carpet into her open mouth.
Eleven months, no longer expecting,
her dumb ears burn thickly green.
Shouldn’t someone have phoned for help by now?
If there was time, it starts after dinner,
which is takeout. Hold your breath.
She hasn’t said a thing. Full purple cheeks
taste like months too. Each unbeliever
owns an empty continent. That wasn’t
your barrel cactus speaking, was it?
Someone will walk the dog probably.
Jason Teal is an MFA candidate in Fiction at Northern Michigan University. He is Founding Editor of Heavy Feather Review. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Quarter After Eight and Eleven Eleven. He is an associate editor for Passages North, and lives in Marquette, Michigan.
