EULOGY FOR SOMETHING, PARABLE OF NOTHING

Purified

or destroyed,

I feel myself

slipping

under the gentle

buzz

of the hospital lights, reaching up towards

piercing sanctity, waiting

for sanity to wash over

my hands, sticky with blood, sticky with memory,

wanting to cry, I shrug

and crumple another pamphlet into my purse, like

making an archive: drink ticket, hotline numbers I probably won’t call,

bubblegum-pink vape, dirty underwear, dirty victim, too late, so much

blood, the detective’s words still

hanging in the air: So, she cleared her throat and

said my name,

What did we learn from this?

I cross my legs and try

to cough up some chronology,

unable to name what

I’m mourning, but feel it, there

my mind, fragmentary

like a blurry, open wound

still

there must be something

part of me

hopes,

waiting for passion

still

stuck with grief,

I just watch

as my insides become: EVIDENCE

carefully

sealed in tiny plastic bags

parts of me

know,

this will all amount to nothing

Stella Georgian is a Greek-American writer based in New York. She was a winner of the Fresh New Voices Poetry Competition in 2019.