A LIFE / MISLAID by Allisa Cherry It began with the smallest things. Earring backs and tubes of lipstick. Estradiol structures. Dropped stitches on salvaged dresses. Growing in size over time to all the books I hadn’t finished reading and all the annotations I’d made in their margins. Well-worn shirts I liked to sleep in. All misplaced in places I’ve since forgotten. I watch the sun drop behind a row of houses and wonder how little I worry about its absence. I enter my room and a nameless cat stretches toward a square of light on the bed. My mother, this year, lost to me. Being a daughter, gone. Not like a twig snapping or a radio switched off, but an idea as thin as fog burning off a warming lawn. My own daughter, I’ve lost her too. Summer died into fall eighteen times and then she slipped over the bridge in her silver hatchback. Years ago I dropped a whole religion. It fell from my grasp and splintered to matchsticks on the basement floor. Now I carry the bundle and strike each one by one to shine a path through the darkness. The universe is not where I left it. I can no longer find it without retracing all those pinpricks left by the stars.
Allisa Cherry grew up in a rural religious community in St. John’s, AZ, near the New Mexico border. She teaches workshops for immigrants and refugees transitioning to life in the U.S. and is Associate Poetry Editor for West Trade Review. Follow her on Instagram @allisacherry
Robin Young is an artist and musician based in San Diego. A retired medical assistant turned full-time artist, she creates daily collage masterpieces, often inspired by the likes of Henri Matisse and Salvador Dali, and shares them on Instagram. Not just confined to visual arts, Robin also captivates audiences as a Patsy Cline impersonator, a role she has cherished for over ten years. Learn more about Robin https://alwayspatsy.com or on Instagram @2SongBird