Veronica Tucker

Autocorrect Changes My Mother’s Name

I type Jacqueline.

The phone suggests

jacket.

I correct it.

Months later

it suggests

January.

I leave it.

January loved cardinals.

January never liked
driving at night.

At the pharmacy
they ask for
an emergency contact.

My thumb stops
over the old message thread.

The last text says

Home now.

Call when you can.

I type her name again.

The phone offers

available.

I lock the screen.

~

Return to Sender

Nine days after my mother's funeral,

an envelope arrives
with her handwriting
crossing the front.

Not the address.

The return address.

She had addressed it to herself
months earlier,

stamped it,

left it unsealed
beside the checkbook.

Someone found it,
sealed it,
mailed it.

Across the front,
a fluorescent label.

RETURN TO SENDER

NOT DELIVERABLE AS ADDRESSED

The address is correct.

The mailbox is correct.

The maple tree
still leans over the driveway
the way it always has.

Inside,

one folded sheet.

Nothing written.

Only her name
at the top,

waiting

for the letter
she never got around to writing.

I turn the envelope over.

The adhesive
has yellowed.

The stamp
is still good.

The post office
has carried it home
exactly as instructed.

---

Veronica Tucker is an emergency medicine and addiction medicine physician, writer, and mother of three in New England. Her work has appeared in The Offing, ONE ART, and American Poetry Journal, among others. Her writing has been recognized by Best Microfiction 2026 and has received Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominations. Her debut poetry chapbook, The House as Witness, was published by Quillkeepers Press in 2026.