The Bluestone Review 2025

The Bluestone Review

Dresser of the Dead Paul Jones

This is why she had gone to beauty school-- not to prep spoiled teenage queens for their proms

or updo some bride before her promises, but to give someone their final glamour. She liked to visit the visitations, stand near the coffin, try to overhear

what was sadly said between tears and sobs. One man paused. “They did a good job on her.” Had they, young and in secret, once been lovers? She saw her work, more than resurrection, a send-off looking better than in life. Only she could manage close perfection. But for herself, who could do the honors? No one. Rather be picked apart by crows.

Streetlight Paul Jones

The corner street light blinks then dims-- one brighter flash before the block goes dark. Small brown bats return to the moon- lit field rich with moths and beetles. Small sparks rise from the dry neglected grass; fireflies dance before they mate and work. Someone might mistake them for stars so near the ground but still part of the sky. Not to say that nature came back in this darker black, this old mystery returned in a twist of lights, but to say this is how the wild replies.

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