Caesarean
by Caleb Johnson
In our shower I peel tape
holding together the edges
of your stomach, terrified
you’ll come undone.
Once free the scar smiles.
Your eyes are boiled eggs.
Unhurried seconds go past
without response to voice or hand.
We all die, I gather,
perhaps amid a simple task,
naked as we arrived, rinsing glue
off a lover’s puckered skin.
Caleb Johnson is the author of the novels Telegraph Road(Hub City Press, Fall 2027) and Treeborne (Picador), which was named an honorable mention for the Southern Book Prize. He has been featured on the Emmy Award-winning television show TrueSouth. His poetry has been published in Appalachian Journal, Birmingham Poetry Review, and elsewhere. His nonfiction appears widely in magazines and newspapers, and has been cited in The Best American Essays. He lives in Boone, N.C. and teaches creative writing at Appalachian State University.
