by Linda Brooks
cornertable
Winter’s blast enters with me
slamming the glass door to the café
you’re already here, pretending not
to wait, holding your gaunt frame erect
You move when you see me, stepping
forward with careful pace, waving
a pale tight-skinned hand, choosing
the table in a sunlit corner. You’ve aged
twenty years in two, so thin you almost
fold in half. Wanting information
on the cancer, I lean in to hope
I didn’t get the email attachment, I say…
The left corner of your mouth jerks
the way it always has. You release
a deep sigh, then details: biopsies
mesothelioma, late stages, prognosis
You accept the coffee, declining
the menu with minimal gesture, then
frown as I place gold coins on the table
I don’t want … anything, you say.
We don’t notice the ten am rush as
we measure our words
with resolute precision, stalling
and starting, clinging to script
You disappear into the street, drowning
in the traffic, leaving
me to walk the other way
I wish you’d let me say goodbye.
Linda Brooks completed BA Hons at Southern Cross University (SCU) in 2019. Several of her short stories have been published in anthologies: Coastlines 5, 6 & 7 (SCU), Wood, Bricks & Stone (Catchfire Press), Grieve (Hunter Writer’s Centre) and Longing for Solitude (Stringybark Press). She’s won creative writing awards: first prize for The Legacy University Level Creative Writing Award; first prize in the Gabe Reynaud Creative Writing Award and the Mater Misericordiae Grieve Writing Award. Her poem ‘Leaves’ was published in Seeking the Sun, 2012 anthology by Central Coast Poets Inc. She’s had two short pieces published in The Northerly – Northern Rivers Writers Magazine, ‘Waiting’ and ‘Billy and Me’.
Emerge Literary Journal 