Amnesty Week | R.J. Lambert
Blizzards in July.
Or was it June? Soon
the sun would glaze
our snowflaked
lashes, eyelids like little crowns
peering down upon
the unmanicured grounds.
(Our lakeside trailer lot.)
In fairness, my inner child
could in no way
have observed to manicure
as a landscape verb.
I’ve thought a lot
on what to do,
contingency to
prevent resale. Set it all
on fire or drag it off.
Doors locked, the foil
in one side window
like a silver tooth
flashing a worthless grin.
I swear, all the houses
in that town
look like an old man
bent over, praying.
One might have thought
electrical & heat were on.
No water, dry pipes,
some human urine
in the yard.
The thing nobody knows
is that a hoarder’s house
is mostly mail,
pages from magazines,
old workout machines.
Movies seem fake,
like it would take
a mental break,
a bottle & a half
of some off-label pills,
a line of coke.
No joke, it only took
a childhood in the church.
My grandma cutting
naked women’s bodies
from an art textbook.
These days, the temptation
of Christ might just be
like you & me:
not getting ourselves up,
poor at picking up after,
failing to put things right
back. The picked-over library
shelves are sharp like Jesus’
rib cage, its hinges showing
through the artificial brown grain.
Received another email
& dates are overdue:
It’s amnesty: return your books
today for free.
About the Author:
R.J. Lambert (he/him) is a queer writer, editor, and teacher based in Charleston, South Carolina. Surviving the 1999 Columbine High School shootings fostered his interest in the healing power of writing in response to individual and communal traumas, which he has explored through scholarly research, presentations, and poetry. Recent poems appear or are forthcoming in The Broadkill Review, The Main Street Rag, and Posit, as well as in his debut collection, Mind Lit in Neon (FLP, 2022). R.J. teaches science writing and health communication at the Medical University of South Carolina. Find him online at rj-lambert.com.