Stare down headstones, then we walk them,
me and Daddy in the graveyard.
Oak Hill actors, they talk ghostly
under blossomed white magnolia.
Baby corpses cradled under
branches swaying lazy, tangled.
Father, mother, sister, husband
lower my bruised apple rotting.
Worms they crawl and chew my eyeballs.
This October, orange falls down.
Heaven’s waiting for its daughter.
Tree arms blaze and fiery limbs wave,
wave bye to me. I’m still under
Southern roots and branches, breathing.
Cemetery trees by Lori Lasseter Hamilton | Poetry Reed Diffuser
Lori Lasseter Hamilton is a slam poet and spoken word artist who has competed in Southern Fried regional poetry slam competitions as well as local poetry slams in her hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. She holds a bachelor of arts degree in journalism from UAB, with a minor in English. Lori was nominated for the Pushcart Prize for a poem that appeared in Synkroniciti Magazine in 2022. Her fourth chapbook of poetry, "limo casket," was published in 2022 by Voice Lux Press. Some of Lori's poems have appeared in SWWIM, Ghost City Review, Poetry Super Highway, Avant Appal(achia), Medical Literary Messenger, The Stray Branch, Global Poemic, Steel Toe Review, and Birmingham Arts Journal. She is a rape survivor, breast and rectal cancer survivor, and works as a medical records clerk.
