Photo Montage:  Watts Towers © by Masumi Hayashi

My husband was gone two weeks,
before his father tracked him
down, dragged him back to me,
afro crowned with lint, cheeks
sunken.  I ran him a bath, scrubbed
his body, his head, picked the lint out,
the way he picked at the carpet
when he thought I wasn’t looking.

Joy Beshears Hagy lives on High Rock Lake in Lexington, NC with her husband, two dogs and a cat. Hagy holds a BA from Salem College, and received her MFA in Creative Writing from Queens University of Charlotte. Her poetry has appeared in various journals including Poet’s Canvas, THRIFT, Main Street Rag and Southern Gothic Online. Her poem, “Rapture” was chosen by Kathryn Stripling Byer as Honorable Mention in the 2006 NC State Poetry Contest.