The mail comes

by Catherine Whiteley
Wild Poetry Forum
Second Place, September 2012
Judged by Troy Jollimore


The mail comes,

nothing but bills and a note
from an avocado asking me to rip its skin open.
Fucking avocados and their junk mail.

I miss you.

Upstairs cab fare is hidden in a sock, my mother
taught me this. When my father died she turned
the house upside down looking for a check
to pay the funeral home.

The truth?
I miss you – what else matters?

The urn was brass. I imagined it a football,
tucking him under my arm and making
a dash to the car, to the freeway — to anyplace
that wasn’t there.

I think the mailman has stolen your postcards.


he surprise of the “avocado asking me to rip its skin open” and of the line that follows are at the heart of the reader’s enjoyment of this poem. The last line is evocative and mysterious. ---Troy Jollimore