Elizabeth Mathes Centrifuge

Centrifuge

In the bluing of my morning computer the meter and line of last night’s pre-sleep dreams dart in and out of cerebral fissures. I follow. Dry river beds snake through the bear grass of the Bitterroot Mountain, or, is it the sage of Chaco Canyon? My first cousin Mary Sue and I play with chalk. Draw hop scotch lines and Prairie Elementary Sucks on the school basketball court. Our giggles dissolve with autumn rains. Same cousin swears she was there, she wasn’t when winged soldiers knocked on our door and announced that Dad was now memory. Folded into frontal lobes by white-gloved honor guards. God created death so we can live again. The priest’s words hung over mourners like No-Pest-Strips. Was this the first time I questioned God? Omniscient who created light. Then what? Forgot. And darkness crept in again. Falling airplane parts reflected off the South China Sea, forty years later, still, the precipice of all thought.

Elizabeth Mathes

Elizabeth Mathes is a counselor who specializes in autism. Married to a retired music educator and composer, Elizabeth has a 30-year-old adult son with autism and is often inspired to write when walking with her son in North Idaho’s alpine and glacial beauty. She has published poetry in small literary presses across the United States.