Cursed – Amy Lauren
Should I scrub the front steps with brick dust? My pill bottles rattling
like a zydeco band’s washboard, nightstand drawer sliding
open with its own mind. My hauntings manage themselves by day,
meted out by the pill cutter my doctor suggested instead of liquor,
a vice injected in my nightmares seemingly on their own, black magic
swilling back in a constant communion with graves.
Victory chips can’t dump it down the drain. I am
hanging horseshoes to calm my nerves, my father’s daughter
sleepless nights & all, his big eyes summoned in mine, & only
lullabies of want can point me the right direction, magic
song that rum handmade from sugarcane could
put to bed. My home remedy cost less than a prescription to undo
my past, the swallowed girl his
church coaxed into boys’ arms, head bowed under spells
of holy smoke machines & legs quaking & hands raised to heaven.