“’It tastes like liquorice,’ the girl said and put the glass down.
‘That’s the way with everything.’
‘Yes,’ said the girl. ‘Everything tastes of liquorice. Especially all the things you’ve waited so long for, like absinthe.’”–From Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway
She brought unleavened news to dinner
I felt that flock of congratulations flap
out, free as doves at a wedding.
They were not welcomed.
I’m not sure I want to keep it,
she whispered, with sour clovers in her voice.
Ah, so she’d made the discovery
that everything you think you want tastes of licorice.
I told her I’d been there, chosen the same.
The doctor had let the air in
& the spirit out, a sneeze reversed.
And I’d survived the vacuum
with only a list of baby names
& a little extra weight as proof it ever happened.
I didn’t tell her what no one told me either-
that you’ll be forced to draw a line across your life
& forced to live on only one side.
And in the new normal,
you’ll continue to count months
& hate anniversaries that should have been birthdays-
because the only new life to be born
out of this will be your own.
No cigars, no announcements-just licorice.
For C.L.
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