Underwater rumblings off the coast of Oregon, apt occurrences while I ponder seismic waves crashing through my brain. How much pain can you possibly cause all these years later? The…
I thank her too early, the woman who has brought me tea in a broken handle cup that was once my mother’s. It’s plain orange pekoe, the kind that ails…
“You maybe want to get a cocktail?” Michael asks, his head is hanging out the bus window. We are both a bit overheated, already drunk. He’s pointing at this dive,…
The winter of 1992, the phone rang off the hook and wild dogs got into the peacock hut. Harriet read the last real winter had been in 1986, when the…
It was early March—not yet spring, but not entirely winter—when you stopped eating. There were still traces of snow on the ground when you stopped talking. O inverno limpa os…
In June 2018 I made a discovery that I shared something with my dad. These letters serve as a way to explore and connect our shared experience. Chris and Christin…
Rose petals lie open to the wind. Vibrant fuchsia has faded to a soft blush, the color now muted of its former vitality. A few petals have fallen and now…
Mom had cancer when I was in preschool. Breast cancer. Four-year-olds shouldn’t have to think about much beyond counting by ones and coloring inside the lines. But cancer doesn’t care…
After dinner we have time Daddy’s feeding tubes cleaned his pillows fluffed so Mommy, Paula, and I spread puzzle pieces on the basement tile floor. Manicured gardens surround an old…
Across a tiny white square of table, your friend Joanie is slowly dying, although neither of you is supposed to know that just yet. She is wearing an exultant silk…
the curve of her spine falling like rainwater. the smell of whiskey in her hair. a dirty gold braid longing to be loved. this is the twin that sleeps above…
I sat across from him, shooting his portrait with my phone. His charcoal sweatshirt faded into the dark booth. He played tic-tac-toe in the dim light. I should have known…
Here, a village road, darkly quiet, winds under sunset’s opal sky, wisps tinged turquoise green, rose, tint the low horizon. Here, a country lake, old sailors dock weathered boats, dusty…