Urban Legend

Abstract

Urban Legend Denise Duhamel (bio) Two best friends draw a circle in the sand and say hello to the full moon, not knowing that eight states away one friend's mother is in the trauma unit. A dark fist of clouds grips the moon, and one of the friends feels a moon pit in her moon stomach. Her father insists that he is fine but the doctor points to the heart monitor where there are dangerous dips in the hills. Her father says he wants to see his wife two floors up in the same hospital. His wife is put into a room with someone else from the same accident, a woman who insists she was covered with his wife's blood. His wife makes a dry-cleaning joke. His wife squeezes her morphine drip and the cloud fist finally releases the bald moon, the cloud's fingers turning dark like hair covered with blood. When both of your parents almost die the same day, everything starts to sound very odd: Give me liberty or give me death. Give me puberty or give me wealth. Give me lunacy or crystal meth. Give me Mini Me or give me Austin. Give me Miami or give me Boston. Give me Sally or give me Beth. Stifle me or give me death. For example, Ice Novel is an anagram for Violence. Ice Novel They were once live, They knew nice love. They were never once evil, Never once vile. She was el novice [End Page 83] Cooking in a lice oven In her once veil Until that subordinate Xmas, that vice noel. My parents were in an escalator accident. A pileup of fifteen people. My mother lost her hair, and almost bled to death. My father's heart went out of whack. They were rushed to an emergency room in Atlantic City. The doctors were having trouble finding enough tetanus for everyone hurt. It sounds like an urban legend, except it really happened. When I take the plane to New Jersey, it's September 11th, 2003. I'm almost the only passenger on Spirit Air. I've packed scarves, lots of scarves, to bring to my mother in the hospital, since I imagine all her hair is gone. The scarves are the ones Nick's mother wore before she got Alzheimer's. "What about this one?" Nick says, holding up the black and pink flowers. "Or this one?" He holds up the yellow stripes. The purple and white checks. I sit next to a businessman who has a bad back, who had originally wanted to drive home in one of the company cars, but his job ran late and he's lost his wedding ring and his wife isn't happy. I tell him about the escalator accident, what I know so far, and I call it a freak accident and it occurs to me for the first time that's what it is and when I get to the hospital I hear about the woman whose earring was caught and how her lobe split open, a parting curtain. The escalator accident, the escalating conflict in Iraq, fears escalate, escalating tensions. . . . I see the word escalate everywhere in the news. I know what I'll do. I'll write a sestina using only up and down as end words: up/with people; don't give up; stick 'em up; get up; gitty up/pony; this is a hold up; cheer up, give me ten sit-ups; shape up; shut up; up tempo; up/ward mobility; we all have our ups/and downs; up up up/in a puff of smoke; up up/and away in my beautiful balloon; movin' on up/(like the Jefferson's); up/the ante; we all have our ups/ [End Page 84] and downs; are you down/with it; a real downer; Down/syndrome; Downy/Softener, going down; down/town; down/and dirty; down/ there; the market's down; down/for the count; touch down; low down; down/ward mobility; down/ward spiral; down/the hatch; down/the pike; down/and out Speaking of Legends: A few weeks later, taking care of my parents, I pray on the...