By Lance Larsen
Featured Art: “Cornelius” by Lily Jarrell

The elevator opens and out rolls a gurney draped
in a kid’s Easter quilt that could have been
shoplifted from T.J. Maxx. All yellows
and pinks and pastel blues. Look how pretty,
my mother-in-law says from her wheelchair,
are those puppies or bonnets? Oh, good: she hasn’t
noticed the outline of the still body underneath.
Or the name tags from Larkin Mortuary
on the two teenage attendants maneuvering
the gurney. Probably the third body
they’ve picked up today and it isn’t even noon.
Girl fake-smiles but says nothing.
Boy looks like he’s auditioning for a job
as a gargoyle. Have they taken a vow
of silence, I want to ask, or only surliness?
Or maybe their mouths were wired shut
at the mortuary? That’s when I notice
they both have earbuds in. Is this standard
practice, to plug in Britney or K-Pop
when you pick up a slowly cooling body?
If asked to guess what lies under
the quilt, Sistie might say rabbits or lemon
meringue pies and expect to be right.
That’s the world of memory care.
I wheel her away from the quilt but that’s all
she wants to talk about: Wasn’t it so pretty?
Yes, oh yes, I say, but aren’t these Halloween
decorations also pretty, Mrs. Cat arching
her back, even this nasty vampire smiling?
I keep looking back, like Lot’s wife.
How about more discretion with the sheet,
I want to ask. Make it black linen, or gray,
a polyester blend that washes up nicely
when splashed with body fluids. And maybe
try something human, something recreational
and brave, with your mouths. First, roll down
the Deathmobile windows and vape a flavor
like bubblegum lemonade. Next, sing
anything bouncy and Beyoncé, your church
voices swirling above this blood taking a final
ride through this bumpy world. Or maybe
mash your hungry mouths together (we can all
use practice) at every red light in Spanish
Fork, eyes clenched tight as baby fists, till
some rusty pickup honks to say the light is green.

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Lance Larsen, former poet laueate of Utah, recently published his sixth poetry collection, Making a Kingdom of It (University of Tampa Press, 2024). His honors include a Pushcart Prize, an NEA fellowship, and inclusion in Best American Poetry. He teaches at BYU and like aphorisms: “A woman needs a man the way a manatee needs a glockenspiel.” Sometimes he juggles.