From the roof of the Cotton County Courthouse, looking out past the flagpole toward the west, you can see the lots on which my grandparents’ houses stood; the bare patch where Tracy’s dog, Blackie, lies buried; the filling station, still operating just across the highway from Deenie’s old yard; the Hart-Wyatt Funeral Home; the rodeo arena; the unused railroad depot; Sultan Park; the Electric Co-op’s grain elevators.

You purchased a / Spider.

A plant nobody planted grows in the window across from mine on the fourth floor.

The Icelandic word for lamb is “lamb,” but the village where I climb down from a tall, hot bus is called “Hvammstangi” and I’ll never learn to pronounce it quite right.

Oh my god, they say.

a skull tattooed on my neck