Black Biscotti

[…]

Sitting on the toilet I eat licorice. I look at my tongue in the mirror above the sink. When I close my mouth in the mirror there is I. I brush and spit, brush, spit. I floss and am in bed. In bed I read. A horse cut in half drinks and water comes out of its cut belly.

The woman Maini bends to see what my finger points at. Three of these and one of these. I take the paper bag brown in my arms over the counter. The butcher wraps the bresaola and the macinato and the sausage in three different sheets of paper, then wraps them all in one sheet pink. Do not buy eggs today. The butcher says, Bad for liver. Mr Holz is in his office. Bows and puts the checks in a drawer and gives me an envelope. Home, I eat the bresaola. Brush, spit. Floss. Bed. I read. The Baron rides a cannonball to the moon.

Ossa dei morti are bones of the dead. You eat them on the graves of your loved ones, the woman Maini says.

I open up my mouth.

All sugar, the woman Maini says.

Sugar in my moustache, I say.

[…]

Published in Gigantic n.2

http://thegiganticmag.com