One of the side effects is a tenderness of the tongue. Hearing this I envision a swelling of the organ accompanied by abrasions and continual bleeding. A little white dog threads through my vision.
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You always served us soft-boiled eggs in egg cups. I remember this from childhood. Over time the roosters have diminished, their feathers less jaunty, combs faded from continual use. Where the paint has chipped the ceramic shows through, the color of an unwashed tooth.
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The undiminished pleasure of taking the back of a spoon and cracking the smooth continuous surface of an egg. I used to have skin like this you say, cupping your hand against my cheek.
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To expose the lungs make a single incision from clavicle to sternum then draw the scalpel in opposite directions toward the heart and lower border of right lung.
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Watching the little white dog run along the edge of the lake I think of you. There are patches of skin where the fur has fallen out and though it is shivering they say it’s not cold just a rare genetic condition.
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From the dock I watch the lake seize and thrust forward each time losing itself on the shore. There’s something impossibly melancholy about this continual losing.
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The beach extends in both directions beyond my field of vision. Its surface slanted every which way breaking the face of the sun into bright mirrors. As if it were a body loosed from its form.
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The little dog picks its way across the pebbly beach. Breaking the waves with her body. Her fur glints across the water, a startling white against the lake’s dull patina.
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Go on I say as dark water seeps up my pants. I am shivering in my clothes. No sound but the aspen leaves shifting in the wind yes no yes no.
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There is nothing left to be done. Endless, the ways of not knowing. Only one certainty which is that we are losing you one day at a time.
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We’re all a little afraid says the voice on the line. I am only half listening. The other half is running into the lake past empty vodka bottles a ruined baseball hat and what look like tiny oyster shells strewn across the beach.
