Family Trees

By Leslie Cairns

(Twitter: @starbucksgirly)

—Family Trees—

My last name

Is a cairn–

Yet, I am

Nowhere to be

Found. Slick, rocks

To help hikers

Find their way

Down ravines, stumbling.

& in my name

There’s a hollow.

Holidays are spent

Going to bargain

Stores, dollar trees,

Instead of real

Leaves. I fold

Green dollars into palms,

Instead of finding

Real leaves.

My therapist says

To make my own

Gifts.

I purchase bones

For my pets,

Let them open

Gifts, as if animals

Want to devour

Wrappings of words,

Books, markings, traditions,

The way I do.

My last name

Is a cairn,

No one believes

Me, yet I do.

A tree fell

On me, pine.

The doctor said

We were fine.

Near death experience

Turned into wind.

Luckily, I’m believed, for

It fell twice:

On a friend,

As well. Her back

Hurt for days.

My mind concussed.

I use that

Moment the roots

Upended, to travel

To the doctor.

Gives me an excuse

To ask her

These words long gone,

The meanings behind them,

The roots, the prefixes,

The vowels which

Hold them. Please,

My name means Cairn.

I am lost.

Tell me what

These words say, again:

Please redefine them.

Family, mother, living-

Loss, forgotten, estranged.

The last one

I know, I think

It means a tree

Untangling from Earth,

To fall on top

Of me. She smiles.

The doctor she

Indulges me, takes

Out a dusty

Dictionary, and paints

The words into

My spinning brain.

You’ll be okay,

She says, smiling.

To feel pain

Is to behold.

She makes me place

Grey Rocks in stacks,

To prove her

right,

showing

I can do it.

-Leslie Cairns

About the Author:

Leslie Cairns holds an MA degree in English Rhetoric.

She lives in Denver, Colorado. She has upcoming poetry/flash fiction/short stories in various magazines, including Coffeezinemag and Pink Plastic House, amongst others.

Recent publications: 'Almost Like a Hermit Crab' (Spoonie Press), 'The Sunlight's Going Bad' (Healthline Zine).

She was a Honorable Mention in Exposition Review's Flash Fiction Competition (2022) for her work, titled 'The Moths are Caught There'.

You can follow Leslie's Twitter at @starbucksgirly.