For the Bakers, Two Lynched in South Carolina

Ryan Lally

Have you seen the marker in Lake City,
the reprinted mourning
dependent on footnotes,
and did you stop to wonder
how long it took Lavinia to stop
setting a place at the table for her husband,
for her daughter,
for each little life she grew
until they collapsed like dreams in the morning light

Have you traced the pathways of the moon,
that swirl of stars pounding relentlessly
over the earth, and gulped all that absence
between two points of life, knowing that the stars die
slower, that someone, anyone, could have snapped
their necks waiting for a God who was more than stone
and the suffusion of mirage and seen nothing
but the same stars that you see

Have you ushered their negligible decay
into the pages of your amygdala,
or have you measured your distance between them
Yes, you say that history is black and white
while you live in color. Now they are fading;
you are indulging in forgetfulness,
and you are happy you are happy you are happy.

Issue 10, 2018, pg. 21