Erin Carlyle

Transformation

Before my dad’s funeral, I watched

my mom fumble in the trash for a Xanax

she dropped. I helped her find it

buried deep at the bottom under coffee grounds

and other discarded things.

By the smell, the trash hadn’t been

taken out since he died. I sifted through the stuff

he threw away, still rotting there

though it had been a week: fruit, food wrappers,

cigarette butts, old meat. He was gone, but the trash

was still there, breeding life, something

from something else. I found the pill under

it all, and I handed it to her with a glass of water.