New World Writing Quarterly

“God grant me the serenity … “

Charlotte bowed her head but kept her eyes open, most­ly to see who else was look­ing around instead of being rev­er­ent and prayer­ful. The Fox News blonde’s face was squeezed up tight, –more

Ghost Petting Zoo

Some say, Wake up and smell the cof­fee, but I say, Go to sleep and smell the night. Take a whiff of night’s musty cocoon, replete with mag­no­lia petals, yarn,  pen­cil shav­ings and bro­ken heir­looms. Do you know you –more

–more

He thinks of her every six months or 6,000 miles. The Soul Asylum sou­venir T‑shirt she gave him became an inside-out oil rag in his garage. She insists the band is his favorite. It’s not. Ever since high school and he first heard the song “Shine,” –more

Dave sat across from Steve. They occu­pied a two-top near a win­dow at a small bar in down­town Wichita. It was mid-after­noon. A Friday in October. The sun was out, but it was cold, and clouds were mov­ing in from the west.

They were on their first drink –more

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