New World Writing

The peach tree lives for how many years and one day it keels over with the wind. Last year there were peach­es. This year it can’t hold its weight. So we have to tear it apart so we can burn it. When did it start to dimin­ish and crack? Does every –more

At fif­teen Anne bought her first action figure—Wonder Woman. When she saw her on tele­vi­sion in her blue star­ry shorts, legs ris­ing out of red boots, steel cuffs, and gold tiara, Anne fell hard. No girl could match the Amazonian Princess Diana who –more

the pat­terned tiles gleam
on bath­room floors
spilled bath­tub water could
nev­er be sold

here i keep my
aro­mas bot­tled and slathered
for every morn­ing shower
lath­er, lather
my lavender

calm, yet another
trapped sun
caged inside
a paper –more

Note: These poems are from Cheapside Afterlife, a book-length sequence that reimag­ines the life of the 18th-cen­tu­ry poet Thomas Chatterton. At age 16, Chatterton invent­ed the imag­i­nary per­sona of a 15th-cen­tu­ry –more

When John is my boyfriend

he says let’s melt crayons into a big rain­bow and we peel them with our rough fin­ger­nails, lay them in a met­al pan, ROYGBIV, turn on the oven. It’s sum­mer, my dad’s at work, mom at school, and we are look­ing for a snack when my broth­er yelps –more

Translated by Toshiya Kamei

A thread­like pale light wrapped around your body, melt­ed, and dis­persed into the morn­ing air. Cocooned by the sun’s rays seep­ing into the sta­ble, you caressed my mane as you hummed a tune. Then you replen­ished the water –more

We were the kids who nev­er got called to the advisor’s office, asked what our plans were for col­lege. We didn’t go to the foot­ball games or pep ral­lies, didn’t play in the band. We were the kids no one both­ered to bul­ly because we were coun­try –more

Tommy and Bobby. Geometry class. Def Leopard tee shirts and gelled-up hair. They were like the fruit our moth­ers taught us to put back. Apples with bruis­es, berries gone squish. They weren’t much, but then, nei­ther were we. Fleshbelt under our crop –more

As a child, my front teeth dan­gled over my low­er lip like escapees from den­tal prison. Braces fixed my over­bite, but not my diastema—the space between my front teeth—which men found allur­ing although I did not. Cosmetics aside, they were ser­vice­able –more

They stand in the mid­dle of a hol­lowed-out 7‑Eleven, search­ing for food or water or some arti­fi­cial­ly-sweet­ened sal­va­tion, but all of it is gone. Not even a pack of cin­na­mon Trident or a spicy Slim Jim to be found, and they’ve looked in every cor­ner, –more

I kneel beside a bag of mulch, dig­ging with a trow­el between two stone-encased flowerbeds, when the thought of our future hol­i­day in Russia makes me hum “Vacation” by the Go-Gos. I added the trip to my buck­et list after Aunt Masha’s funer­al. –more

Dad says, “In the lit­tle car­tridge, you mean.”

“Right,” I say, “but also one inside?”

He leaves the bath­room. Goes down­stairs. I wait there with his red-gold piss still steam­ing in the bowl. The bar­rel should be point­ed rough­ly where my feet –more

Maybe still in the recov­ery room, I hear my Nana say, it’s okay hon­ey, there are plen­ty of oth­er fish in the sea.

Later, not in the recov­ery room, I’m feel­ing for­mal, a lit­tle hun­gry. So Swoon and I decide to go out for a fan­cy oys­ter din­ner. We –more

Mom made us wait at the top of the board­ing stairs for Dad. A pilot and for­mer pilot train­er, he’d popped into the cock­pit to com­pli­ment the CAT crew on a smooth land­ing. The C‑119’s shrieks still rang in my ears as sol­diers in flared jeans and –more