Fine Flu Journal
  • Home
  • Fiction
  • Poetry
  • Photography
  • Submit your work
  • Interviews
  • About
  • Contact
  • ISSUE 4

Ryan Kent

6/22/2014

0 Comments

 
Not a hypothetical

Taking the rear exit of my apartment building
I found a bamboo cane, thumb thick, leaned against 
a brick wall, next to a 50 gallon trash can.
I picked it up and saw a retail sticker on the side
that someone had tried to remove but gave up on.
I leaned against the same brick wall and wondered
who had used it. A student who walked with a limp.
An old man with one leg shorter than the other.
Maybe it was just a prop for a Halloween Costume.
It made me think of the photo of you framed in my hallway.
You were slightly hunched over, almost off balance, as if 
there were a dumbbell in your beehive. Your ankles were 
swollen and the dress you wore reminded me of the couch 
a kid I went to high school with slept on down in his 
parents' basement. You had a string of pearls around 
your neck someone could jump rope with. Standing 
in the shade with your family, there's a reflection
of the tree you're under in a window behind you
and it is almost like I am staring into another reality;
one that would ripple if you touched it. One which
is permanently dusk, where I watch our family 
members die like house plants. Then I 
realize, that reality 
is really this 
one.


0 Comments

    Bio:

    RYAN KENT is the microphone player for heavy metal band GRITTER. He has studied at Virginia Commonwealth University and Sarah Lawrence College. He lives in Richmond, VA with his wife and dog, and collection of Star Wars action figures.

    Poetry

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.