The Anniversary
by Sonya Taaffe
Sonya Taaffe's short fiction and poetry can be found in the collections Ghost Signs (Aqueduct Press), A Mayse-Bikhl (Papaveria Press), Postcards from the Province of Hyphens (Prime Books), and Singing Innocence and Experience (Prime Books), and in various anthologies including The Humanity of Monsters, Genius Loci: Tales of the Spirit of Place, and Dreams from the Witch House: Female Voices of Lovecraftian Horror. She is currently senior poetry editor at Strange Horizons; she holds master's degrees in Classics from Brandeis and Yale and once named a Kuiper belt object. She lives in Somerville with her husband and two cats.
When I died, my lover tucked me for safekeeping
between a draft notice and a dresser key
in her diary,
she hid her heart in a pillowcase of old clothes
and pretended she was running for the train.
Even now, she leaves out slices of lemon
as if I will chew them to wake up, standing by the sink.
She scratches lottery tickets, makes the same spinach soup.
When they burned my body,
it cried like a violin.
May 22nd, 2016