Good Grief Ghazal

My mother’s mother cast out a golden net of grief.

My mother makes a midnight mass of girlhood grief.

I am her devoted disciple by God and umbilical.

Like Isaac, not listening will do me no good, grief.

My memory is a coffin the length of my father’s life,

the width of my mother’s. I thought I understood grief.

Life is not simple—it’s a clock with two hands of flesh

between which, palms up, long-nailed, stood grief.

I’m not ungrateful and have little complaints. I, well-loved,

offer myself up to you. Don’t let me be misunderstood, grief.

In my palms, blood makes a broken halo of my nails. Dry-skinned,

puncture wounds like stars—I’d set them down if I could, grief.

Like a child, I think this world can both save me and kill me. Oh 

Abigail, what would a saint make of you? Good grief!

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Abigail Bailey is a high school student and writer from Maine. A '24 alum of the Adroit Journal's Summer Mentorship Program, she loves Leonard Cohen and the snow.