The Long O

Hailey Siracky

I am five, and in the mirror

I am making faces, thinking

about all the words I don’t like

the sound of: their long o’s

and the way they turn my lips

into the entrance of a tunnel

bad sounds can bounce around in.

A train’s whistle, a ghost,

an audience, shocked.

My mom’s best party trick is

planning her funeral. She asks

for Johnny Cash, to be buried

in spandex, for mimosas

when it’s over. The audience

is shocked. Their lips make

the shape I don’t like, the tunnel,

they don’t know in this family

we think death is going to be the best

day of our lives.

My mom used to make me

put change into a swear jar.

I was little. She told me “shut up”

was a swear. I knew it wasn’t,

but that’s the one that kept taking

my quarters. I wanted to hold

out my hand for coins every time

I had to say hula hoop, roof, balloon.

I wanted to hold out my hand

every time she planned her funeral,

said the words I don’t like, made me

the shape of the softest girl

curling in on herself, the sounds

disappearing inside her.

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Want to read more Hailey Siracky? She has a brand new poem in Issue 3 which you can buy right here.

Hailey is online here.