Porcupine Ridge amygdala

Spit and rain collected on her lips coalescing into a film that pops with a trembling word:

Ma? Surface tension breaking apart into a silence that prolongs itself as her chest, concave and congested, strains with the effort of breathing,

because the last time I saw you was your head tipped back up to the sky showing your pale and unwashed neck as dirt was thrown onto you like salt over a shoulder, and no one wanted to touch you cause you were sick so you were buried face down, all ragdolled and all scrunched up,

back in the sour slum courtyards of Mississippi at sunrise saturated by tupelo gums, wet grass under her like thinning hair, all swelling in the wet darkness of deltas and swamps pruning up in the moisture, Ma's coffin crumbles apart along with her.

So how is she here?