SOMETHING HE DID by Jennifer Whitaker
On a day cold enough to remind him of home,
my father, whisky-warm, dragged from the shed
the kerosene heater, sending the mangy dogs
to the fence line. The overfilled tank, the choke
of kerosene soaking ragged into the wood floor,
he coaxed the heater to hot blush
with a single match and finally slumped to sleep
next to the trailing hair of its heat, its burning chest,
its hot mouth gagged with rags.
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