Ode to Lizzie Borden
- Apr 8, 2022
- 1 min read
by Auden Eagerton
I can trace the tree rings in my palms back to your sharp-toothed head.
When my mother blinked, I saw you glinting back at me.
As a child, I took the resemblance as creation myth, proof of every axe-beat in my blood.
In the Fall River house, there’s a bed and breakfast now. I could lie down in the roost bedded with dead pigeon feathers and feel right at home.
At my parents’ house, they make a museum of their own.
My father splits his eye over dinner with a glass of wine so he doesn’t have to see the plumes of feathers at his feet, lulled by the snoring in the cask of his chest.
I wonder how long you watched your father’s snoring before felling your own family tree.
My sisters burn their dresses in the sink.
You’ll find me spine-snapped, metal mouth buried in clay and ash.
Auden Eagerton is a nonbinary trans man poet located in middle Georgia, where he pursues an MFA at Georgia College. He has been published with Across the Margin, Feral: A Journal of Poetry and Art, Whale Road Review, and others.
