Wakeup Call
You'll always remember the first time
you lied about who you were. Your mother
Is unusually quiet this year, your annual
vacation to Arkansas. You're in Star City.
Downtown there's only one city block,
every building is dead. She sighs. She says,
my friend from high school killed himself.
You don't know what to say. Is she okay?
Yes, it was a long time ago, we were kids.
He was gay. I think only I knew. Your chest
grows hot and sharp. You feel the loss and
you feel like a fraud and suddenly
fear runs torrential down your spine. Here,
your mother grew up, so did her parents,
your blood. You've come here every year
and called home this place that kills, felt
safe in the graveyard of people who now
feel closer than your own family. As if
you've learned nothing, you step into her
childhood home, a coward who tell lies.
By Grey Weatherford-Brown
Biography:
Grey Weatherford-Brown is an undergraduate at Susquehanna University. They are a poet, memoirist, and sister. Although they are a Pittsburgh native, their family hails from Arkansas, and they have grown into their Ozark roots. Their work has previously appeared in The Literary Bohemian and Essay Magazine.
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