Caroline Cabrera

You asked for my statement / I wrote you a recipe

In the old days

there were so many ways

a child could die

so many ways to look

a farmer in the face

and see dust

cracking his face skin

in the end Marmee

comes but Beth

still dies

the simplest girl

always sits lame

in a bed

waiting to be

remembered fondly

while the other

children wander

leather-booted

in an orchard

trying a fallen apple

here or there

or feeding apples

to horses

saying its not

the sweetest

of apples

leaving the barn

doors open while

the cider ferments

a cider that tastes

like horse dander

with acetone body

a blood sausage finish

a cider we taste

together

and when I say

it tastes like horses

you reach for it

say I love horses

Caroline Cabrera is the author of Flood Bloom (H_NGM_N BKS, 2013) and the chapbook, Dear Sensitive Beard (dancing girl press, 2012). Her second full-length collection is forthcoming from H_NGM_N BKS in the winter.