how to move on

1. denial. some people go out to get milk and a pack of cigarettes and they never come out. so you rationalize. the milk shipment hasn’t and never will come in. minimart ran out of his favorite cigarettes so he went camel-hunting. he’s skydiving or naturewalking or whatever the fuck else. but obituaries don’t say “went out to get milk. -love, dad.”

2. displacement. you blame your mother. you blame yourself for drinking too much. you blame god for not existing and your neighbor for cooking too many damn casseroles.

3. catharsis. you burst the bulb. you fill with kerosene. it takes you days to find your hands, feet, legs, again. gravity realigns. you are stoking the fire with your own flesh. you are being put out.

4. you bury the body. preferably, it is not your own.