The Imposter Poem by Jason Bouthillier

My mother, youngish, in shorts and tee
huddled upon rumpled sheets, cheap bed
and me. I'm only sweet ten, and've cried
more'n a boy ever should, next me my
little half-sis, and outside the monster
breathing against the door of wood.

Dark, feminine hair on my boy body,
She asked about a plane for Oregon,
And I said yes Ore-gone we'll be, though
We'll be taking half of him with us.
In a tense, crisp, Florida morn we crept;
Field mice that yearned to fly upswept.

Four hours the wind-sounds lulled me,
Far from the flat lands made so terrible.
Yet I was happy when I saw clouds so high,
at the ends of our roads, and was delighted
when I was told they were mountains,
and my mighty friends watched me approach.

There with my dead aunt whose
Teeth were often lit, with sky so dim and big,
She handed me a flop-ear bunny from a
Chicken-wire cage, and her spry mutt
Didn't jump, her rabbit didn't scratch, and
Were all well-behaved and smiling.

It was the picnic of the horror movie
Where everything's alright, bright, oblivious
To dark hour phonings from the Devil crying
For his Persephone's flower to wilt southeast
And so she gathered her seeds, sparse trite things,
Bereft, and left dignity and peace for the beast.

I went with her shade, and the one I'd never see again
stayed. I, a package, wrapped tight for now,
Started to unravel over two-thousand miles,
And my contents were no longer content.
Her eyes white, no irises, pupils no more
delivered blue, tearful eyes to the burning wood door.