Aunt Rita's Father Gets Bad News
Jennifer Blair
At the doctor’s office he only nodded,
picked up his coat, and left. One month
later, they found his truck on the reservation.
His relatives searched for awhile, then went
out to his garage and found enough for two
yard sales. End tables. Lamps. A dusty line of
stuffed quail traveling along a lacquered log.
Myriads of caps for an army of heads, coffee
mugs, fans, car batteries, even a strange belt-
contraption rumored to vibrate off a belly.
Still in perfect working order, a niece
commented as his giggling grandchildren
waited to take their turn inside the machine,
smart modern children, shaking, laughing—
perfectly dispossessed of the puerile belief
they would ever walk away thinned down.
