The Bones of Us
Holding us together. Our skin is cosmetic
and thin. We gather together at work
and on buses. We hold paintbrushes
to form portraits of each other.
It is possible to live your life backwards,
you, emerging full-formed at birth,
only to undo everything, year by year,
skin slipping slowly away.
And maybe the last day on earth,
before we go back to earth, either
buried or ash, we wonder if anyone
ever truly knew us. As if it were the skin
they might recognize,
a dress we wore, a flower
we held to our nose that time,
instead of the bones of us,
gristled now or scattered,
and that was what held us together:
not faces, not names, not even love,
but the shape we left behind.
Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, was recently published by Cervena Barva Press. Her work has appeared widely in various publications, and she is a recent recipient of a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City.
