Cannibals

“Want a Coke?”

“I’m good.”

“All right then. Come stop by soon.”

You want me to shove that tongue down to your stomach?

You won’t be able to. He’s never hit you.”

It was low tide and the yellow earth of the riverbed was visible through the shallow water.

july of 1989, the sixty-third

broken bicycle that looked as though even if someone tried to ride it, it could do nothing but turn right for eternity; a black umbrella whose broken frame thrust out of the water like the mast of a ship; a tinplated bucket which,

Jinko-san the fishmonger was near sixty, and her right arm from the wrist down was gone.

She was wearing her black apron and gutting a fish.

“Heading home?”

“Yeah.”

“Today’s your birthday.”

“Yeah.”

You want me to shove that tongue down to your stomach?

the prosthetic hand of the fish shop owner