She said, I love you too,
with her arms
crossed
the way Christopher
Hitchens
says he’s susceptible
to music
as if it were
temptation
against his better
nature;
the way raisins
paint the sun
in their dark
ridges
like negative film.
She said it like a
press release.
Even when I was
seven
eating from a
folding table
in front of the TV
and the burp of the
back door
made me freeze with
the spoon
halfway between my
mouth
and the torn clouds
of my mash potatoes
and the sitter, a
child herself,
looked at me with
deer’s eyes
and said, as calmly
as she could,
Your father’s home,
I knew
that she meant, Run.
Originally from Arkansas, John Schellhase is currently serving as a Peace Corps volunteer in the
Philippines. His poetry has appeared or
is forthcoming in Barnwood International
Poetry Magazine, Foundling Review, Strong Verse, and Gray Sparrow Journal. In
2007, he received the Walton Fellowship in Translation for his work with
ancient Greek verse.