Life isn’t bad, just blurry, says Corner Connie. She’s a star: thin fingers, skirt slung against her hip. She reads newspapers every morning, takes a sip of coffee from a needle to the vein, fades when evening arrives. Finds another newspaper to sleep under that night.

I blush when she says I’m gay.

And she freezes because that’s not the routine of the joke.

There’s blood in my cheeks and my hands and my vision and I laugh.

And she asks me again—

not kidding.

And I see it all.

God’s face staring down after years in a Baptist church. Mom saying she never took us to the services enough. Mammaw telling me she’d have a heart attack, Grandma mentioning that poor waiter.

Words are power; but feelings are just unfinished thoughts. I shouldn’t make concrete out of questions, so I laugh again.

The laugh is not the 17 year old laugh she knows.

She knows.

At the bottom of her purse

is a lot of lint. And two pieces of

Melted Candy.

She saves them for the grandkids—

whenever they come.

They don’t care if it’s melted or mishapen.

Tastes like memories.

Tastes like sickly sweet love.