“As I was lying there with my eyes closed,
just after I’d imagined what it might be like
if in fact I never got up again, I thought of you.
I opened my eyes then and got right up
and went back to being happy again.
I’m grateful to you, you see. I wanted to tell you.”
-For Tess by Raymond Carver
i.
They mutter behind the door—
little girl and therapist,
crescendos and dips.
I was behind the white door once,
my life spilling all around
the leather furniture and
polyester Persian rug.
My veins opening to a
stranger because no
one else knew
how to keep me alive or
how to point me back
to joy. Stumbling
and falling, I found my way,
casting in mountain streams
and hiking the elk’s path,
pocketing pebbles
to remember those places.
Now she is behind
the door,
pockets empty.
ii.
She wants to kill herself.
Ten years old and she’s
had enough.
New age music chimes
and recorded water
droplets beat
my ears, drowning
the conversation behind
the closed white door.
I wish we were
fishing. I can’t help
but think if I could
get her into the mountains
in Idaho, pole in hand,
the lullaby of a stream,
the shush of arctic breezes
through yellow pines,
carrying a bluebird’s aria
would be enough to heal her,
to show her there is
happiness that clings to trees—
it’s waiting for us
if we can get there.
We could lie on the grass together,
in the triangle patch of sun
between mountain peaks,
eat chocolate licorice
and imagine
heaven together,
imagine death,
then be happy that
we are still alive,
still together
for now.
Gwen Holt resides in North Carolina and has an MFA in Young Adult literature from Converse College where she serves as the Managing Fiction Editor at South 85 Journal. She is the winner of the James Applewhite Poetry prize honorable mention and Southeast Review Narrative Nonfiction prize. She will publish her fourth YA novel, Imani Unraveled, with Owl Hollow Press in February 2019. Her essays, poetry, and short stories can be found in the Remington Review, Southeast Review, North Carolina Literary Review, and several anthologies.
What a pleasure it was to read words woven so beautifully and purposefully. Thank you.
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