excerpt from slab by selah saterstrom (coffeehouse press, p. 191)
when she was brave enough, the girl harriet turned over the remaining card on madam surget's makeshift table.
something comes to an end, madam surget said. this is a gate card, the heart's path, but broken open, diaspora.
it is the story of people leaving their homes and never coming back. and the moon goes through all its phases at once.
it is what it is. the best you can do is accept it.
make an offering for what is lost without judging how that offering is received. always set a place at your table for the dead. know too that their number includes you. cast yourself as a figure, leaving. while you go, tell yourself stories you learned and made. it all enters memory, the watery grave of what you will, in other words, forget.
when you can, give the precious version, yourself as you are, the story of your survival after the death created through having loved.
there isn't time to pack a bag, you must be on your way.
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