History

By Rachel Custer

There is only one story a woman says and maybe
she is saying something about the truth, or maybe
not. The history of a place like this is the history
of those who leave it. It’s a great place to be from
they might say, and smile. Pretty men and pretty
women and their easy belief that they are moving
forward through the world. Their necks graceful
in their city clothes. There is only one story and
it is not this story, sweat and grease and the grace
of ritualized days. The pinch of repetition in the
joints. The world would be forgiven for believing
the best of this land is the dust that a hand knocks
from old boots. Maybe there is something of the
truth to what she says, like there is only one way
to live in a place one cannot leave, and that’s to
love it. Take the raw animal of its days by the
throat and throttle the one story from its jaws. Or
maybe not. There is only one way to live in a place
where everybody believes nobody lives. Like
there is only one way to be a fire and that is to burn.

Rachel Custer’s first full-length collection, The Temple She Became, is available from Five Oaks Press. Other work has previously been published or is forthcoming in Rattle, The American Journal of Poetry, B O D Y, [PANK], and DIALOGIST, among others. She is currently completing the Tupelo Press 30/30 Poetry Marathon fundraiser. “History” was previously published by Tupelo Press.

Visit Rachel’s website at www.rachelcuster.wordpress.com.

Photo credit: © 2014 K-B Gressitt.