NEW FEATHERS ANTHOLOGY
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Photo by J. R. Korpa
A Hat on the Bed
Steven Mayoff
 
 
It is dark magic making itself
at home for an afternoon,
all bare cupboards and a skip
in the phonograph.
 
It is evil spirits living in hair
and the hat portending 
a death 
in Jewish households.
 
It is lice from the Old World
migrating to pillow cases
and bad luck pressed under plastic
in all the photo albums.
 
Hats and beds come together 
in an unholy alliance: the outside 
world encroaching 
through the keyhole.
 
A hat on the bed invites a visitation
of unsettling dreams 
molded into hospital corners. 
Cocked toes strain 
Against a cocoon’s thread count.
 
We all pray for a little death (une petite
mort) to grace this hard-scrabble existence, 
before rising miraculously 
from our beds 
 
to cross the Great Divide.
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