TOWN OF THE BELOVED by Allison Seay
We rested on a blanket by the water
where I combed the sand and spoke your name gently
You slept but I was not tired and never have I studied
the fullness of a back not even of the dying
propped on their sides as I did yours then
I tried to mimic your breathing though I did not close my eyes
at least not for long instead I kept a kind of vigil
swatting for you what seemed a thousand nameless insects
See it was afternoon the ocean warm to boredom
boat oil and pelicans and I thumbed through a book
while I waited for you to stir to apologize but for what
for disappearing for leaving me to distinguish alone
my desires to want you or want to become you
Wake up please wake so that I might tell how it is
I can for you sit all day in a field of sand
Listen to Allison Seay’s reading of “Town of the Beloved” below…
GOSSIP TOWN by Allison Seay
When Esther is pouting and knows I am bored with her
she asks if I am having one of my Days,
and I say What? meaning no, meaning yes
I am, and she says again and louder, “Are you having
one of your Days” and the word Days is like a string
of beads she pulls from her mouth,
a long accusatory sound (like feign or blame).
We gossip to kill time though she thinks it is only
any good in a town where people hate (as in hate) other people.
For instance, Hazel Hamilton was dead in her house three days
before anyone went to see her, mostly meaning well.
If I had tried, I could have spied her in the wingback
through a slit in the curtain. Sometimes when I have a Day
(as in Hazel) I spend the afternoon in the yard
and imagine her nest of white hair
peeking over the other side of a mouth-high fence,
ivy draping either side to keep in or keep out
whatever needs keeping. Esther reminds me
about being unkind
lest I die alone and unfound in a chair by a window.
It is such an example, she says, and I say of what
and she is in her pouting way on the paint-flecked glider
saying oh
I think you know
as though it is a secret between us
(what secret there are no secrets).
Listen to Allison Seay’s reading of “Gossip Town” below…