Latent Prints
I don’t know how people live
without me. No, really. Everyday
I live with myself.
I’ve never not.
In the living room I cut
Aliya’s hair, and when she stood
a dark crescent moon
outlined where she sat.
Everything leaves something
behind, I’m told. Rope fibers,
gunshot residue, boot prints in mud
and muddy boot prints. If I were to step
outside my body and walk away,
I could see what shape
my absence takes.
Surely, it has a shape.
by Madusen Gummer
from Bodega Magazine