Salt Wife

By Mari Pack

Among the Rabbis, there is some debate:

What damned the sinners?
Men, their mouths open — hunger,
hunger, hunger. Hands, asses, thrusting —
frantic as questions. Sex —
always to blame.

Or an issue of hospitality?
Give us your guests
said the mob at the door,
but Lot jammed the lock, offered
his own daughters, hair rolling down
their backsides
like lace.

Who could miss this city?
They say Lot’s wife. She turned, so they say
she liked it.

No, I disagree.

That’s the thing about women,
always looking backward
to see what we’ve lost:
What did she face in her doubt?

Was it smoke rising
like jellyfish,
an unmistakable smell of eggs?

I turned to wave at the terminal —
whistle of wind through a pillar of salt.