East of Wyoming, I Remember Matthew Shepard
After The Entombment by Raphael
The night my father died, I sat on a stool
at the Buckhorn, gazing
out the window’s cool counter seat.
Like a funhouse mirror, you appeared.
I have a familiar-looking face; my father used to say—
his wish for me to blend in.
Late after an argument, I fled
and was found bound to a prairie fence
after eighteen hours.
My body is like a sock in the wind
in a field just a mile from here.
My face blooms, velvety
and light like a lamb’s ear,
stachys byzantina; my ears
frozen with blood; down
my neck, it goes. A medley of ants shuffles
away. My body is rich with the sour smell
of urine on my head like a crown of daffodils.
Copyright © 2023 by Ruben Quesada. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on November 27, 2023, by the Academy of American Poets.
“The tragic account of Matthew Shepard’s hate crime murder in 1998 is linked with the visual and emotional cues from Raphael’s masterpiece The Entombment. The painting, which depicts Christ’s solemn burial, is a profound parallel between Shepard’s tragic end and the LGBTQIA+ community’s grief. My poem is an homage to Shepard and a reflection on the ongoing battle for equality and acceptance that marginalized people continue to fight.”
—Ruben Quesada