By Tara Betts

Sometimes Luis still makes me so angry,
my tears feel like the hot heads of matchsticks
Choking a headstone only chaps your hands
when you realize dead men don’t listen much
better than a living one does. They blame me
for this death. Ask questions pointed like Luis’
needles. Why was the insulin in the drawer,
instead of the counter? Why were you late, Linda?
Did you remind him? You know how he forgets.

I shoulder the mourning like a third daughter. Nod,
listen like an obedient daughter-in-law because
I loved him in spite of the bitters Luis stirred into
the cup of my living. He promised to stay, be my
tattoo. The only ink of him left is his name on
my shoulder mixed with “azucar”, his slick whisper
in a fading dream. We leave the cemetery. I grit
my teeth behind the portals of black sunglasses.

I get home, go to the kitchen to make sandwiches
for the girls. They ask for Kool Aid. I am fine
until I reach for the 5-pound bag of sugar, staring
at it like an enemy. I punch a hole into its half-full
middle, screaming at Luis for all of this, all of it.