Poems
“I read the line over and over / as if I might discern / the little fires set / the flames of an idea licking the page”
“Illumination,” Natasha Trethewey
“Even Assholes Get To Be Anonymous” & “True Crime in Trees”
Even Assholes Get To Be Anonymous You hit a bottom — what they say it takes to know you’re not okay. Find a program, two initials; last one is A. To make the circle round this room, brand new, goddamn nervous, too, stripper at a church — not there to pray. To find...
Hummingbirds
When my father was eighty years old and mellowing, he decided to win the Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes. Since he was well-off financially, he said, “If I win the ten million dollars, I’ll give it to you son, and your family will be set for life.” Of course, I...
Practicing the Faith of the Indiana Grandma
A voice stained with black Folgers and Misty cigarettes, Maw-Maw begins her afternoon sermon to us, the stale boozed stench high school sophomores, on the benefits and pitfalls of early promiscuity— because that is a woman’s world after all. Granting this wisdom from...
Signing in the Waiting Room of a Women’s Diagnostic Imaging Center
Waiting amid sparse pairs of the patient — reading, knitting, heads down — I glimpse fluttering hands, sparkling ripples of conversation rising above the sea of floral fabric chairs. Eyes straying from magazine, keeping head down, I watch the exchange, and I wonder....
Request Radio, Saturday Night
After a two-pitcher Sangria dinner after three days tarring the biggest roof in Travelers Rest, he’s waiting for Darlene who’s been under that roof for twenty minutes, getting the guilt-free frozen dessert they’ll eat at her place. He’s hoping she’ll surprise him but...
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