The Mud Hen by Beverly Jackson

Connie all chubby under Bloomingdale's Better Sportswear says pink mouth overloud with is that a smirk? that she and George bald corporate hubby saving grace is he likes poetry but unable to make eye contact with women who aren't his wife are going to Georgia on my mind lately too, Ray Baby to visit Beth our mutual but I thought she liked me best friend who sent a pricey porcelain mud hen in exchange for my chapbook for a big party, so big it'll be held in the stables like a fucking mansion, that horse house, with more amenities than my little hut where Beth said all the horses will be Ho! Ho! hanging their heads over their stalls and part of the party staring into the eyes of a bunch of drunks and wondering how long before some asshole shoves stuffed olives in their mouths and of course catered by that what's his name, you know the fairy with the tarts to die for? not remembering for a minute of course that my brother is gay nor that I know all about her allergy to everything with hair which is why she probably married George in the first place. How nice for you I say sand settling on my tongue like the Sahara Desert almost as dry as the time she told me over lunch that she had herpes and I said Check Please! A gorgeous day for a party I say moving her to the door noticing the dust that dances in the sunlight which is fodder for poetry but no, she looks and collects some gossip for the horse house about my housekeeping goddamit have a good time. Excess eyeliner trying to pull a Liz with violet contacts she squints at me I'm sure Beth wanted to invite you, sweetie, she says, but it's couples, you know? and she finally hits me in the middle of the unmade empty bed and one single coffee cup washed over and over and the dog who gets hugged too often and I picture her bloodied under the hooves of a stallion crazed by a Manhattan poured in his ear and I feel my chest clinch with my faker's face and the desert falls in a sinkhole the size of South Carolina Don't forget your antihistimine, you cunt and my door closes on her fast, fast enough that she doesn't see me going down, down..

 

Beverly Jackson: Beverly Jackson, editor of the monthly ezine Literary Potpourri, and publisher of Lit Pot Press, Inc.'s quarterly anthologies and poetry collections is a poet and writer whose work has appeared in Melic Review, Zoetrope All Story Extra, Pindeldyboz, and Rattle, to name a few, and will be in the inaugural issue of Night Train. You can reach her at jacksonwrites@cox.net or by visiting her online magazine at http://www.literarypotpourri.com