What it Means to be Touched
Kathryn Silver-Hajo
Am I not willing to believe
that all will somehow be well
when kerosene creeps
under the door threatening
to ignite everything
we love--
our bodies free
from judgement and intrusion or
an animal
we can’t understand
searching for vanishing ice
scavenging wretched
truckstop cafe dumpsters
its whiteness stained
not from blood
nor the hunt but
a surfeit of ketchup packets
the rotting remains of
a fisherman’s platter
all that was beautiful in this world
turned strange--
and when the beast inside me rears
ready to snarl and strike
you soak the flame-hungry petrol flow
with rags of old cotton things
we’ve loved like
the threadbare t-shirt I wore to bed
on a night shimmering hot and enticing
as a mirage
and you having averted disaster
if only for a moment
come to remind me
Kathryn Silver-Hajo is a 2023 Pushcart Prize, Best Small Fictions, and Best American Food Writing nominee. “The Sweet Softness of Dates” was selected for the 2023 Wigleaf Top 50 longlist. Kathryn’s work appears in Atticus Review, Craft Literary, New Flash Fiction Review, Pithead Chapel, Ruby Literary and other lovely journals. Her flash collection Wolfsong was published in 2023. Her novel Roots of The Banyan Tree is forthcoming Fall 2023. More at: kathrynsilverhajo.com; facebook.com/kathryn.silverhajo; twitter.com/KSilverHajo; instagram.com/kathrynsilverhajo