Death stops at my table
rests his chair against the pepper shaker
stoops to adjust a sandal strap.
You’ve been greedy lately, I tell him.
Four friends since February.
His eyes are welded to the floor
though there’s a subtle quiver
in his hand, white-knuckling
his key ring.
I did bring you a new grandson
he parries, resting a gnarled finger
on the scale of my complaint.
Three felines this year, I kvetch,
some not all that old.
But thanks for taking care
of the attic rats.
I did it with fruit spray, he says.
No toxins in your house.
Rats in Frats, I mumble.
Now that things are quiet,
I miss the keggers.
It’s all practice, he smiles
for—well, you know.
How’s your back float?
The somber synagogue is no place
for my elfin father. I picture glee
inflating his face like helium.
The white pine box looms huge.
Bent men stoop, wrapped in tallises
like serape-bound women.
This day should be a carnival
for a man who oozed mischief.
I might have worn my long red skirt
waited for him to throw off the lid
look death in the eye and
mouth his usual refrain:
let’s get this show on the road.
A Darth Vader hearse rolls up
limos in its wake. We joyride
through the faded neighborhood. Dwarfed
houses hold their breath against the past.
My mother laughs in spite of herself
giddy with emotion’s flush.
We squeeze hands against the pain
brave sailors rigging the mast.
At the gravesite, a bouquet of shovels
stand like saplings in the frosted fill.
Spun sugar glitters our stockings
as we seal him under, high heels
punctuating snow like cleats on summer lawns.
We do the light work
while the gravediggers take five, shovels poised
blowing into their awkward anonymous hands.
Sandra Anfang is a poet as well as a visual artist and editor. Her poems have appeared in a long list of journals including San Francisco Peace and Hope, The New Verse News, Spillway, the Mac Guffin, and Rattle. She has won numerous prizes and her work has been nominated for Best of the Net, a Pushcart Prize, and Best Small Fictions. Her two chapbooks, Looking Glass Heart and Road Worrier, were published by Finishing Line Press in 2016 and 2018. Xylem Highway, a full-length collection, was published by Main Street Rag in 2019. Finishing School is her 2023 chapbook from Kelsay Books. Rara Avis, her fifth collection, was published by Kelsay Books in July, 2024. After careers as a Reference Librarian and elementary school teacher, Sandra taught for ten years with California Poets in the Schools. She is the founder and current co-host of Rivertown Poets, a monthly reading series, in Petaluma, California. Learn more at www.sandeanfangart.com/poetry
