What I Miss Most About Hell

Eugenia Leigh

is prayer.

I’d pack a plastic bottle

with vodka, drive

to the crag of my life —

the parking lot of a pancake house —

and scream. I prayed

like everyone I loved was on fire.

The bright, violet blob

I called God

would forgive the atrocities

roared in ethanol rage

while I’d shake like a dog

demanding answers

from the maker of figs:

why the sycamore fruit

sweetens only when bruised,

the way a fist will

ripen a child.

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