The images that flash in my mind are not my grandfather’s last breaths, his frail wrinkled body giving up after cancer ate away his insides. Not my mother lying in a hospital bed after the surgery to remove nine inches of her diseased intestines. Not choosing the cheapest wooden casket and a burial plot near the orchards. No, with the phone to my ear—suddenly, I’m rocking my daughter to sleep, our cheeks touching and her hair tickling my nose. I’m spelling F-I-R-E T-R-U-C-K for my son for the 17th time. I’m distracted by the freckle on my husband’s lower lip, intoxicated with his scent—lemon and orange with a hint of musk. I’m standing at the edge of Niagara Falls letting the mist settle on my pores and the wind whip my hair. I’m sitting under a tin roof on the back porch of my childhood home, stargazing on a clear Appalachian night. I’m catching fireflies in Tupperware. I’m belly-up on the side of a mountain, blinking raindrops from my eyes. I’m singing a favorite hymn in Harbison Chapel, the stained glass illuminated by moonlight. I’m staying up too late in a dorm room to debate Descartes by lamplight. I’m at the beach, the salty air on my tongue and sand clinging to my knees. I’m floating in the ocean, nearly weightless, allowing the waves to carry me where they may.
___

Bethany Jarmul is an Appalachian writer and poet. She’s the author of Take Me Home, a mini-memoir available now from Belle Point Press. Her full-length poetry collection Lightning Is a Mother is forthcoming with ELJ Editions. Her writing was selected for Best Spiritual Literature and Best Small Fictions and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, The Best of the Net, Best Microfiction, and Wigleaf Top 50. Learn more about her work or her writing webinars and classes at bethanyjarmul.com or on social media: @BethanyJarmul.

Artwork by Tyler Haberkorn