I hope we both show up late to your party in heaven
I think of the gold cross around his neck and how I would like it better
if it were dangling in my face.
I think about replacing it with my arms.
We went to a thrift store. He held my hand with my thumb on the outside
(there isn’t a wrong way to hold hands, but that felt right).
We looked at a painting of Jesus.
I told him I’d only buy it if
Jesus was at our last supper, female and black.
He had a stupid grin, and his eyes rolled
like your sex dice on a hotel mattress. The
night you got a room with two beds. One to
sleep, the other to play. But I
fell asleep in one, while you had your back
turned towards me in the other.
When I was a little girl, I wore white sun dresses to church.
I was put in straw hats with felt flowers.
And I watched the older kids speak at the altar.
He was one of them, at his church back home.
A lector will raise one arm for the response of the church.
The same way I could pin both of his back.
I don’t know the word of the lord;
I could improvise.
Kat Fabian is currently a senior at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She is an English major with a track in Writing Studies.
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