Anhedonia

John Schellhase

 

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.

 

 

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