Tira
Matthew Gellman Taupe dappled with furry sienna mapped itself over her legs and crown. When my father called us in from the garden, she barked, ran first: she knew how to yield. So no one expected to hear, weeks later, my brother’s voice rise like a storm-shredded cloud, to feel the wide-eyed nerve of belonging prick and swell to a nervous attention, to see his face, heaving like a battered moon, a mess of tears on the staircase, blood striped across his white tee-shirt like poppies seizing a snow-covered field. The next morning, a neighbor took her away— I knew then not to ask any questions. My father bandaged the wounds, four bite-marks. I dug a hole in the yard for her toys. My family learned then not to trust innocence, to believe that affection could always break skin. And I started doing what I’ve done ever since, what a child does. I buried things. |
About the Author:
Matthew Gellman is a recent graduate of Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, NY, where he received an Academy of American Poets prize and the Frances Steloff Poetry Prize. His poems are featured or forthcoming in Poetry Quarterly, Word Riot, Two Peach, Lambda Literary’s Poetry Spotlight, and several other publications. Matthew currently lives in New York City and is an MFA candidate at Columbia University. |