Are you surprised I am dead?—me too! 
I’m usually more than a soccer mom 
with a wife, a dead husband,
and a six-year-old son.

I left with unfinished poems,
a glove compartment of stuffies
and a hole in my windshield.

I tried to act casual about it—
the masked men, 
eyes bugging out of their heads
padded flak vests and crackling voices.
I backed up and turned my wheel.

You saw how icy the road was.
You saw the guns. 
I didn’t feel fragile—
I didn’t know how fragile I was.

I didn’t recognize
the masked men’s fear
as I turned the wheel—
slowly—slowly—Renee.

One of them shouted,
“Get out of the car. 
Get out of the fucking car. 
Get out of the car.”

I was thinking—I don’t
want this to be happening.
I told one of them,
“That’s fine, dude.
I’m not mad at you.”

            i want back my rocking chairs,
            solipsist sunsets
            & coastal jungle sounds
            that are tercets from cicadas
            and pentameter from the hairy legs
            of cockroaches

            i’ve donated bibles to thrift stores

            

*final stanza from “On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs“ by Renee Good