After the Accident

After the Accident Holly Karapetkova (bio) Things that once seemed safe now suddenly did not. 0.01% is not unlikely odds to the 0.01%. I'd always thought of myself as the majority, the person to whom nothing unexpected occurs, but now I stopped leaving my house because there was a one in a million chance of being struck by lightning. Panphobia. I lay awake at night listening to traffic mount the hill on the highway behind my house, counting the number of cars that would not make it home safely, waiting for the silence. Exhaustion. I'd drift into sleep for a few moments, then another engine would rev and I'd wake to the darkness of the room: a flash of water, the bark of a tree, an opening for my mind to lean into and fall away. [End Page 111] I found myself counting time. Hours since the accident. Days since the accident. Weeks and then months. I was counting to keep time straight. To keep it from telescoping back on itself and twisting around my neck. If I could lay time out in a line, smooth the rough edges straight, untie all the knots, I could keep myself from going back. Repeat. Today it has been three months one week and five days since the accident. I opened my mouth and forced a yawn in place of a scream, the alarm clock trying to convince me it was a new day. The accident was never convinced, spreading itself across each hour like a trail of poisoned apples left for the ants. A bruise blooming under everything I touched. [End Page 112] Holly Karapetkova Holly Karapetkova is Poet Laureate Emerita of Arlington, Virginia, and a recipient of a 2022 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship. She's the author of two award-winning books of poetry, Towline from Washington Writers' Publishing House and Words We Might One Day Say from Cloudbank Books.