Transit of Mercury

The freckle on my sister’s hazel iris replicates the May transit of Mercury across our sun. Every 13 or 33 years, orbits line up to make theory believable to the layman splayed out on Earth like a poor man’s star made of lesser dust. For a span of hours she becomes a universe. And yet, I have no sister. She would have smoked and blown blue out windows, into exhaust vents. Our DNA flickering like ancient Christmas lights that eventually burn down the house. Her hand, the one I held before somersaulting back into a black pool of anesthetic, waking corrected into her security. Or the night our father left, and I held hers. Pressed into life like a fiver for a favour to be called in later, at thirty-seven my sister taught me to drive. I leaned over and held the still-warm wheel while she put her hands up as if surrendering to greater authority. Only ever heir to her absence, I tried to sister my mother, another’s sister, a stranger, a man, air. So when I say I miss you, it’s not to you, but through to the palm trees on the throw pillow that are not actual palms. But I enjoy the idea of their shade when the sun hits them right.