Maree Reedman

That’s the Way the Pickle Squirts

by Maree Reedman

for David Spicer

As you wait for death,

can you hear your wife’s voice?

Feel her hand on yours?

Do you see her paintings,

the last quilt you bought together,

the blue walls of your bedroom?

Your best poem, caught

in the undertow

of your unconscious.

You love the word amygdala—

where my dumb bird of hope sings.

I Want to Leave the World Today

by Maree Reedman

for David Spicer

You’re on life support in Memphis:

fourteen thousand and sixty ks away.

I always have to convert to Imperial for you:

so that’s roughly nine thousand miles from Brisbane.

Please don’t ask about nautical. The fact is

if I left now, I would land too late.

I know the earth is terribly beautiful,

but the purple hydrangeas aren’t doing it for me.

All they do is remind me that bees are scarce

and the world isn’t done with dying yet.

My love to u

by Maree Reedman

for David Spicer

You signed off.

You hated fussing about sickness:

your mother a frightful hypochondriac.

You thanked me for my concern

and promised you’d get better soon.

Your last text. Your wife sent it

six months after you died.

I blinked at my phone,

trying to comprehend.

I long for your voice: your Dakota drawl,

your email rants.

The last book you sent came with no

dedication: none of your loving words

above the published puffs.

I’d told you once I couldn’t decipher your handwriting.

I was rude, you said, some things you don’t say.

You didn’t understand: I wanted to read it all.

You once wrote a poem

about an inscription

in a book you found in a second-hand store.

Maybe that’ll be us:

someone will find one of the books you’ve inscribed for me,

or I for you,

and wonder what became of us.

Maree Reedman lives in Brisbane with one husband, two cockatiels, and five ukuleles. Her poetry, fiction and memoir has been published in the United States and Australia in various magazines and journals such as ONE ART: a journal of poetry, Chiron Review, Naugatuck River Review, Unbroken, Stickman Review, Blue Bottle Journal, Burrow Journal, Grieve, Hecate, StylusLit, The Big Issue, and has won Ipswich Poetry Feast awards.