Resurrection Purgatory In The Laundromat

Behind me, a man retrieves waterfalls
of coins from a vending machine while
laundry owners fold cloth, hold a crying baby.

I’m across the street from a restaurant
we drove to in the haze of motion meant to
anticipate grief—gallons of water, a burnt

quesadilla. What else could I need? Nothing
to recall but the sheer clarity of sky and its
distance from me, pulling out of the parking

lot unaware how effortlessly gloomy it could be
today—dark, imminent, Christian pop music
serenading. A pamphlet beside my chair asks,

What happens when you die? above a cemetery
image, clouds so yellow in the gray like stomach
lining in a porcelain bowl. Little paper icicles

hang from the air vents—the only Christmas
decoration in here. I strain my eyes to watch
the clothes topple around until the black spaces

become a Jesus face in a pan, moving too fast
and a woman folds a sheet for her reflection
in the glass. Will you roll around heaven all day

with nothing to do for eternity? asks the pamphlet.
The waiting is not the hard part—it’s the let
down, infinite coins spilling out of a metal

mouth, a penny for my dead to sprout from
the ground. Bring them flesh, I want the laundry
gods to tell me. Water them, color in the edges

I can’t imagine faded—the world they left
with a heavy clanging. All my life I’ve resisted
prayer, fearing flames, finality, growth—

nothing like this spotless hell.