Prophecy

 

 

 

Prophecy

 

She’s wearing her prophetic shoes today

the ones she hasn’t  worn since her son’s wedding rehearsal

 

She’s wearing them because if in this

sci-fi  dystopian

novel of 2020 this is the rehearsal dinner

 

-the first day of school –

 

then she wants it to be as foreshadowing as his wedding

to his marriage

where life is beautiful

 

even though at the wedding she got

a little drunk

and her fingers got slammed in the honeymoon trunk

 

She wishes she could remember it

 

apparently being drunk is a good thing

when your fingers get slammed in a trunk

 

And thank God it was a Lexus LS 400

because it had the weatherstripping cushion

all around the edges

which someone surmised 

softened the blow of the pain

with the slam of the trunk

 

She’s told her reaction words were very calmly stated –

nobody panic. I’m OK. somebody get the keys before they take off.

 

and the only reason she drunk-cried

on the way back to the hotel

was because she feared not being able to write again

and she needed those fingers

 

she needed them to write the stories

 

the happy stories

the painful stories

the memorable stories

the stories of disbelief

the stories of days she’d rather forget

the stories of days she never wants to forget

the stories of not exactly being the type to get drunk

but getting drunk because she couldn’t stand the sight

of her ex-husband

who was the one paying the open bar tab

so she felt it her duty to drink

as many drinks as she could

yes, one in each hand most of the night,

thanks to her stepson who kept her locked and loaded –

and anyway she dances so much better when she’s drunk

practically professionally, she’s told

-just like Elaine on Seinfeld 

when she saw the video on Facebook – 

 

yes, she’s wearing her prophetic shoes today

they’re sparkly coral-colored wedges

with flashy Rocaille beads on the flowery toe

and do not match anything else she’s wearing

just like all the other logical fallacies of Covid-19 in 2020

 

because despite slammed trunks and

kick-dancing drunks and

ex-husbands and their new hoochie-mama wives

who wear sling-shoulder black sequined dresses to a wedding –

a wedding! – (and people try not to stare, and whisper)-

and her own memories of all that a marriage shouldn’t be –

she knows that 

some shoes walk us straight into

better days