The Sound of Sugar....Matthew Landrum

BLUE LAWS

Sarah’s hair freezes in the winter wind as we walk down
the hill to the corner store forgetting blue strictures

that say you can’t buy alcohol on Sundays
before noon. See—

sometimes it’s not conscience that keeps us
from falling. Forgetfulness

and luck too have a share
in our salvation. This morning leaves us

high and dry. We kill half an hour, observe the icicles
hanging from the spire of St. Mary’s,

wander the neighborhood, past the alleyway
where, years ago, I knelt and prayed for God

to end me. My vomit wouldn’t freeze,
even though it was ten below. And I walked out

leaving that afterbirth of a new life
steaming on the pavement and thought I was finished

with all that forever. But we live on
the edge of a precipice, always one step away

from ourselves. Sarah’s pixie hair freezes
in December, still wet with showering. And when we return

home and sit with six packs by the fire,
it will steam.


ABOUT THE POET:

Matthew Landrum teaches Latin and literature in Ann Arbor. His poems have recently appeared in The Emerson Review and Cold Mountain Review.

ABOUT THE SOUND OF SUGAR:

We’ve loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), so now we want an opportunity to better hear our contributors. We will feature an audio recording of a poem from one of our seven issues, read by the poet and updated every couple of weeks. This an open invitation to all contributors from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to hear it.