Daughters of the Sun
by Emily Deibler
Daughters of the Sun
In her people's beliefs, the priestess
is married to the earth;
in missionary school,
she's married to Christ.
Both bleed swamp mud,
and the priestess' witch lover
is neither the earth nor God,
but all the stars inbetween.
Fireflies and gator eyes hold
none of the shine in the witch's eyes,
her smile, the gleaming jars of salves
and balms she shelves beside her bed.
The linen sheets are worn with their
laughter and tears, and the priestess kisses
and prays against the sigils, the constellations
on her god's dark skin.
Samantha
by Emily Deibler
Samantha
She sat at my bus stop each weekday at 7:30 a.m.
She was six, and I was seven. I remember
her straight hair,
her crooked teeth,
her father’s smile,
her mother’s copper-gray hair,
the glistening grass.
Her mother always wanted me to
come over and play, but Mom refused
to let me visit. Samantha’s mother was
too strange because she never wore a bra
or put in her dentures.
Each school morning, I brought a picture
book about Egypt to the bus stop; my favorite
section was about the pharaohs’
funeral rites. I read to Samantha. As we
flipped through, her oil-drop eyes
were ladybug-round. She pointed with
insistence at a colorful sarcophagus.
One time, she stroked a fly with a weed,
I’ve never seen anyone so in love
with a fly before. As she cradled it, its eyes
gleamed like molten sapphires, and Samantha—
I can’t remember a single word of hers.
She babbled, a string of giggles & squeals.
One fall afternoon, as her mother stood outside
the bus, Samantha hugged her backpack
and wept in her tape-patched seat.
Pee soiled her pink skirt.
The last morning Samantha was there,
red and blue bathed her dewy front yard.
Her father didn’t smile.
Her mother wore dotted slippers
& a faded, threadbare gown,
nipples templing through,
face limp,
no teeth.
Blood stained Samantha’s legs
as a murder of men
guided her away.
Emily Deibler
Emily Deibler is a published writer and poet. Her Gothic horror novel Dove Keeper came out in October 2018. Her short story "Deer in December" was featured in TL;DR Press' Halloween anthology NOPE, and her poems "Turkey Hunting" and "Patty" were published by Z Publishing House. An avid lover of working with other writers, she also acts as a co-editor of Exhume, a literary magazine dedicated to magnifying the voices of LGBT trauma survivors.