Stella Rhame
INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE AFTERMATH
The dirty mug I just drank from
will sit in my sink
until I wash it.
My bedsheets will remain
in the same white silhouette
I left this morning.
The window stays open.
I have left it that way
for a sun I will not greet
until tomorrow forgets me.
I am to do nothing.
The bathroom light is still on,
and downstairs I hear my mother calling my name.
I hear my sister playing the song
we used to sing in duet,
and I sit and melt into the floor.
Grief has made a home in my rib cage.
It fills my lungs
and suffocates me
with every breath.
I am gone, and so is my memory.
Drown it in coffee for me,
and leave it in the sink.
By morning
it will look like it was never mine.