“The Outer Banks” © Darryl Price

 

Idyllic

Across her mouth
a red smear—
lipstick hurriedly applied
you thought, yet
here was such a precise
and tidy woman.

Getting closer you saw
it was not lipstick
but some type of illness or
reaction swelling
her lips blown twice their size.

When you asked
was she feeling all right
her head shook fiercely:
He had slammed her
with the back of his hand
to the point where
she’d toppled.

Your own mouth fell
open in disbelief—

just a few days earlier
the four of us—
the fab four
lazing on soft sand
an idyllic afternoon
at the Outer Banks.

 

Susan Isla Tepper is a twenty years writer and the author of 12 published books of fiction and poetry, and 5 Stage Plays. Her newest book is a Novel set in the deep south and titled Hair of a Fallen Angel from Spuyten Duyvil, NYC.

Darryl Price has published dozens of limited edition chapbooks of his poetry and art, which have appeared in many journals. He is the author of The Ferocious Silence and The Tiger Who Jumped Over the Moon.