He holds in his hand a photo of me with a giant lollipop—half-sucked, colors relocated from the candy to my little mouth and he tells…
I wanted to be tossed in your salt water where the blue edges toward green and a siren pulls everyone’s hair down past their shoulders.…
6th grade: I woke up, found my nipples, they were no longer pink. They were brown suntanned, dry skin, not soft like the rest of my body.…
We were too busy enjoying the dregs of our summer, the last August of adolescence, to pay much mind to the cloaked figure in the…
That morning, I buried a baby bird. She was small and brown as any bird who lived a few days in a box and died.…
a not admitting of the Wound Until it grew so wide that all my Life had Entered it ~Emily Dickinson Unzip me from the inside,…
My friends were fist fights we broke each other down. To withstand what was ahead We ate and spat prophecies misinterpreted as code-switching cyphered with streetlight hymns…
Margaret was the smartest girl in the class because her lunch bread was stale and her windows were dirty. She spent most afternoons hiding from the streaks…
today is father’s day says every billboard in the city the mugs are on sale the surcharge on the brunch is exorbitant and the pub beers…
Someone labored over this swatch of grass, removing sod with hoe then shovel, creating too-perfect a rectangle, severe straight lines with the crisp, stark angles…
Imagine a large herd of zebras grazing on grassy green pasturesFrom the scrub, a Lion sprints towards the optical illusion of black and white stripesInstincts…
She adored rhododendrons & the festivaldedicated to them.Imagine each lung is a sponge said the pulmonologistbearing the shiny frown of his profession. She smoked those…
Built by big, broken, and blistered Negro handsto serve the citizens of South Bend.They named me Public Natatorium,the largest indoor swimming pool in Indiana.I could…
He looked troubled as the requestcame over the intercom.Blind and deaf, he didn’t hearthe flight attendant or see the girlwho pressed the call buttonand said…
1. Exhausted sheep have left the room.Too many nights fence-jumping beneathtoo many pounds of wool, they headfor pastures greener and compassionate. 2. A poem that…
Who hasn’t wanted to do that?He probably had the key,felt the familiar give of the tumblers. He knew the house wasn’t his,but wasn’t it? He…
I wanted to walk down the aisle& see your beaming facethrough my lacy veil but my car was slammedinto the river; the veilthat now covers…
Vaseline, to get the botflyout of his forehead again.He’s had to do it three times; they creepthrough the sticky film to breathe. Do it, the…
For putting the coffee cone back in the cupboardwith its used wet grounds, I forgive youas I forgive you all your lapsed cleaning, the tubscrubbed,…
Little bird,your heart beats fastagainst the glassof the closed windowinside my porch.Hold still.My warm handswrap around you.I turn,take one step, two.In the open doorway,I slowly…
Only when sweat spatters the thin blonde tips, can I spot it— …
It used to be the afterthoughtat the end of a letterthat final smirk of wit, that wistfultraveler meandering late to the fair. That was when…
Like the last dayI would see you. Smiling— Wheels skidding on iceas I push you from parking lot to in-patient. Your handsuddenly becomes a child’s…
I dance the Tennessee Waltzwith Charlie,Old Charlie Blue Eyesin his thick tan sneakers.I hold him under the armsas we waltz, stiffly,two paces from his wheelchair.His…
I wrote them on adding-machine paper with ballpoint pen. I was always at it.Even before the reply to the last had comeI was crafting the…
That frigid Saturday midnightmy mother’s car rolledout of the garageafter me because I failedto park four wheelson the plane of cementthen compounded my errorby leaving…
I sympathizewith the dining room table.The one that’s too big for the space it occupies.You have always taken care of itbecause you use it everyday,but…
—there was no release no parade …
In early May, beneath the stars,the air is humming as the young, male tree frogstrill their love songs into the darkness—long, shuddering sighs of desire,one beginning…
the rumble of her feline songslips between my thumbsthis love like the windcatches me unawarelike moonbeams on midnight’s lakesoundlessas moth wings about the lantern’s bright beam and I’m…
Out there beside the crabapple’s shade,the tyranny of balls, bats, and yellshaunted me somewhat less than if I was closer.I heard a truck grumble down…
I can’t diveinto the gold of flowerswithout hearingthe petalshit the earth. It’s autumn, and I’m learning to processthe radial treesin their decay,the final eggof the northern…
I lean at the lookout and stargazeas Echo Point shrinks like a black holein the cross hatch of bottle greens. huddled in my anorak I waittousled wilderness…
There were those brick cages long and high enoughto suck the daydreams out of our minds.The only hope was a glimpse of a cleavageacross another…
The dusty synagogue window looked out onto the narrow Austrian street belowUnterbergstrasse, where— what the world called Kristallnacht and Jews called the beginning of the end—began The photograph on…
There are no groves in Shady Grove In fact, there is no shade Just concrete and Costco and condos and Wendy’s and RVs and WalgreensThere is no view of…
A patch of gingko-scented snow rests like a cat at the foot of the steps,yawning tawny crystalsinto the muddy grassladen with twiggy leaves. A child lays two…
Pelicans, like pundits, draw you in to the curve of their pouchquietly chewing carp— under your feet sand shifts, as though earth were adjusting in sleep.The clear…
Trees foundsuddenly naked stripped whistled by windswaying, they bare it all like skinned bonesutterly devoid of shame From the mouthof the sky snow tumbles downseason’s…
we tangle around youlike cobwebs when dad passed you brush yourself offsend us back to our own lives time passesetching unfamiliar patternsyour capricious hearta walking stickhelter-skelter…