Notes from a Visit to the Motherland, February 2023
St. Hedwig’s burned down last week. The lights on the bridge are purple LEDs now, abrading my astigmatic eyes. There are no ducks in the stream beside the farm.
Every time I’m in town I wonder if he still lives in that apartment on Division Street. Fifteen years later I still remember the unprintable things he said there. I drove back to my mother’s house that night and on her back porch I realized I’d forgotten my belt. Most times I drive by, but I never linger long enough to knock.
Every time I’m in town I get a body count. This time it was my economics teacher’s husband, pancreatic cancer. There’s a lot of cancer here. Last time it was a friend from junior high, maybe still alive but lost to pills and booze. No one has heard from him since before COVID.
Every time I’m in town I hear about who sold their house and where they went. Dutch Country, Florida, upstate near the border. They have Jersey plates, my mother grouses about the people who bought the house next door. They have Texas plates, her husband mutters about the family on the corner.
Our Lady of Hope is the last church left in the Heights. I got lost trying to find the liquor store that moved across the road. There are no toys in the children’s room at the library.
Abigail Myers writes poetry, fiction, and CNF on Long Island, New York. Recent work appears with Stanchion, JMWW, HAD, and other fine publications. Her debut short fiction collection, The Last Analog Teenagers, is forthcoming in summer 2025.