Saturday, April 13, 2024

A Birthday at a Funeral By Chris Atkin

The Rising Phoenix Review

April 13

A Birthday at a Funeral

My 11 year old brother walked the length of Grandma's living room runway.
The oversized dress hung from his frame, the collar a plunging neckline,
white chest shining/ like moonlight, all fae and fair and joy.
Shag carpet turned grassy meadow beneath her feet.
My father's face glowed hot as he laughed off his embarrassment,
hands balled into fists behind his back.

My brother came out during Sunday dinner.
My father said "define a woman for me" and she said ME,
and the day became a birthday and a funeral
my father's eyes a sniper shot, a death sentence
my sister/ all beauty and grace and power, even in her rage.

My father retreated to the backyard shed, an armory, a tomb,
blackened his hands with gunpowder, poisoned his veins with hot lead.
My sister sheltered in her childhood bedroom, a closed door, a refuge, a cocoon,
shed her skin and slipped into the skirt she hid in the cavern below her bed.
My mother and I still sat at the dinner table, a meal gone cold, a wound, an atomic crater,
stuck someplace between celebration and mourning.
Our silence, a reverence for new life;
A respect for the dead.

By Chris Atkin

Biography:

Chris Atkin is a high school English teacher, spoken word artist, and poet from Orem, He is a Pushcart Prize nominee, a 2022 semifinalist for the Sandy Crimmins Prize for poetry, and his work has been published by Ink & Nebula, Last Leaves Magazine, and the Lascaux Review.