Heather Cadenhead

Fir needles like rattling bones. The air a myth that has been told and retold, fading from emerald to onyx. My skeleton soft like honey, I am a bowl at the edge of the table, waiting to be spilled. The bold silence. Fallen water pooling over asphalt. Fear so absolute it must be forgotten. Heather Cadenhead graduated from Union University and is the mother of two boys, one of whom is on the autism spectrum. She writes at frayedflowers.com. Image…

Nine months of darkness, then the sound of scissors and we separate. I thought I’d love you because you were part of me, feathered limb of a sumac— but it was like falling asleep. Something I did without fear of consequences. That first night, you made the house ache with your sadness. Open mouth of a baby bird, longing. But you took nothing, the thing I begged you not to take. Something I didn’t know how to give. Heather Cadenhead…