Grace Dilger

Grief

You skirt around it a while, 
then a volt of electric concrete
pulling you toward the fishes.
We are left here smoking left-
handed cigarettes long as ribs
of celery. 

We are left here smoking though we’ve quit. 

There may be future seabrined 
ablutions for our aching carcasses
but for now there is only the sensation
of having your skull crushed by a carriage.

In the era of mourning dress
Freud had a word for afterwardness:
Nachträglichkeit. Victims refracting
memories over and over again
chronic, throbbing prism.

Nachträglichkeit, 
a belated understanding.

Nachträglichkeit,
you, thereafter.

Grace Dilger is a poet and educator. Her work has been featured in Peach Fuzz Magazine, The Brooklyn Quarterly, The Southampton Review, Grody Mag, The Elevation Review, Proud to Be: Writing by American Warriors Vol. 9, Slug Mag, The Racket Journal, Yes Poetry, High Shelf Press, Defunct Magazine and the forthcoming issue of The McNeese Review . She received her MFA from Stony Brook University and teaches at Monroe College.