Roaches

This is what my mourning was like. I cried
and pressed my head against the hardwood floor

after killing three roaches. Two had been
in the living room, and I battered them

to nothing with a rolled-up magazine addressed
to my dead roommate. The third was in her bedroom,

all signs of her bleached away by time. It glistened
and darted like a twitchy amber pendant.

No longer holding the magazine, I stomped
on the roach and felt the innards soak into my sock

before I stripped it off, collapsing against the wall—
one foot bare, one still shrouded—as something tried

to pull the rising cry back down my throat. I asked
How am I supposed to live like this? over and over,

while the shadows of the oak trees outside the window
began to take their place on the floor.

Jon Lemay is an MFA candidate at Syracuse University, where he is a Poetry Editor for Salt Hill Journal. His poetry has previously appeared or is forthcoming in Juked, apt, Gravel, Popshot, and elsewhere. Jon has taught high school English at various independent schools throughout New Jersey, Tennessee, and his home state of New Hampshire. Jon also hosts and produces Welcome to the Teachers’ Lounge, a conversational podcast dedicated to the professional and personal lives of educators, and co-hosts Pat & Jon on Their Best Behavior, a pop culture podcast. You can find him on Twitter at @yawnlemay and on Instagram at @jonlemay.