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poetry Death Warrant

From Alexis Rhone Fancher"s State of Grace (2015), an elegy to her son Joshua, we find compassion mixed with irony, grief with dark humor, as the poet's life must go in an absurd world.

DEATH WARRANT

By Alexis Rhone Fancher



When my son’s ticket was about

to go to warrant, I went to the

courthouse and explained to the judge

that he was in the hospital, dying.

Someone in the courtroom gasped.

Someone grabbed my hand.

Josh lusted over a muscle car, a

Dodge Charger with a Hemi-powered,

5.7L V8 under the hood.

He wanted me to buy it. I wanted to

lease it. He said that meant I

knew he was going to die.

The judge looked over the warrant.

“He’s in the hospital, you say?"

“Yes, your honor. Terminal cancer.”

“Good,” she said. She handed the

paperwork back to the bailiff.

“Then he won’t be driving

without a license,

out there endangering others.”

Alexis Rhone Fancher newest book is State of Grace: The Joshua Elegies, (October, 2015, KYSO Flash Press). Her poems have been published in over twenty American and international anthologies. Her photos have been published worldwide. Since 2013 Alexis has been nominated for three Pushcart Prizes and four Best of The Net awards. She is photography editor of Fine Linen, and poetry editor of Cultural Weekly, where she also publishes The Poet’s Eye, a monthly photo essay about her ongoing love affair with Los Angeles.

http://femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/post/131483881177/alexis-fancher…

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