New World Writing Quarterly

Tornado

Tornado pulling bod­ies out of the ground. They tum­ble around the city in pairs of two. Mottled hands briefly touch­ing, then whisked apart. We are con­front­ed by our loved ones once again. It is the after­noon, and I’m lying down in the shape –more

Last Living Woman in America to Get a Pedicure

Like some­thing hidden,
a speakeasy or rooftop garden
behind closed doors low voices
of cus­tomers at man­i­cure tables buzz,
male tech­ni­cians fac­ing them like speed
dates clip­ping –more

For the first two months in Marathon, he’d wake up at dawn, wade out in the flats up to his navel, cast the Tarpon Toad fly toward the five or six mon­sters at the fif­teenth pylon of the dock, about two hours, a hun­dred casts or so, fifty-eight days, –more

Soft Into the Earth

Now, the morn­ing table with pages and words before me. Each dark-slip­pered hour shuf­fling by out­side. The shush of heat through the vents like dis­tant down­pours. I imag­ine trees, brown­ing in autumn hills, their tahi­ni under­sides –more

The Invention of Paper

If some­one hadn’t thought of it
we’d nev­er get the word out
about our miss­ing parakeet,
and the restau­rant menu
would always be writ­ten in chalk
by the wait­ress with the best
chi­rog­ra­phy. –more

Self-Folding Materials (dis­am­bigua­tion)

All day, I feel loose­ly assem­bled, maybe all orig­i­nal parts, but an unfa­mil­iar slack in the joints. Walking home from the super­mar­ket, I clock the not-quite time of my feet. My elbows at weird angles, my shoul­ders –more

Always fly­ing in the face of con­ven­tion, Margo thinks her baby—five days old—the ugli­est baby in the world. Like some­thing to which a wal­rus might have giv­en birth. She has cul­ti­vat­ed a life large­ly free of delu­sions, and is deter­mined not to let –more

The dad pulled into the lot, low­ered his win­dow, cut the engine, and said, “Ta-dum!” But the fusion taco truck stood emp­ty and shut­tered. A paper note flapped on the pull­down win­dow gate: Closed! Medical Emergency!

His –more

Written from Row 14, Seat B 

I feel sor­ry for the flight atten­dants, how dutifully
they try to pre­pare us for dis­as­ter by point­ing here,
and here, and pulling on the loose end of the strap
like so. They say the near­est exit may be behind us

–more

I get us a booth at Gracie’s Diner. Fourth one from the back. Our favorite, mine and Lootie’s. It’s ten o’clock on a Wednesday, one of those weath­er­less days, not too cloudy, not too hot. Not too crowd­ed at this time –more

The faint­ing couch had start­ed watch­ing me.

Pink velour. Victorian. Curved like it expect­ed telegrams to arrive with bad news. I bought it dur­ing a phase when fur­ni­ture felt like progress.

Lately it had tak­en on the air of some­thing –more

In October, I found out what I found out. Now it was the Fourth of July, some nine months lat­er. I was in Baltimore to vis­it Mom in assist­ed care because I’d elect­ed not to speak to her about it on Thanksgiving and spoil –more

#9 Dream

I was in Manhattan, on the #9 train. At the sta­tion, a large crowd had been backed onto the plat­form due to a dis­tur­bance ahead. I noticed what appeared to be a lane of clear space and fol­lowed. –more

Redemption

It kills me to throw them out,
I say to my mother
who’s been dead for 35 years.
I’ve been dead for 35 years, she says,
you think I care what you do with them?
You always said I don’t –more

53^rd Birthday

Starting to think it’s too late
for my mid-life crisis—
too poor to buy a sports car,
adverse to wounds for an earring.
I spend time
with my first drug, television,
watch­ing –more

The psy­chic is every­where. The gro­cery store. The cor­ner store. The library. In a sub­ma­rine. The rest­ing home. The restau­rant. Outside the vil­lage phar­ma­cy as an extra in a movie. –more

Body Surfing, Spring Break, 1973 

turned into body slamming
in the dark waves’ sud­den shift,
our young invin­ci­ble swim trunks
near­ly yanked off in the sandy swirl,
and if you knew me then, you’d –more

A Poem in a Magazine

When I was young I read a poem
in a mag­a­zine in which the poet wakes up
in the morn­ing, walks to the kitchen,
& waits a moment before flicking
on the light “to let the roach­es scatter”
& –more

The Pretenders

The book land­ed some­where between bad and unbear­able. I sus­pect­ed it from the start, but kept read­ing any­way. Maybe to beat back bore­dom. Maybe to look lit­er­ary. Probably a lit­tle of both. But after two chap­ters, –more