New World Writing Quarterly

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

There was out­right pan­ic when chil­dren began cough­ing up tiny chick­ens. On play­grounds from Ankara to Accra, Uppsala to Utica, chil­dren paused what they were doing, opened their mouths and coughed out minia­ture plumed Brabanters, –more

Timber

We grew tired of stand­ing with no one reclin­ing in our shade, climb­ing our trunks, or hang­ing swings or bird­hous­es from our limbs. What were we even here for? There was no sol­id line of us bor­der­ing a park, no clus­ter –more

Bush Baby

The man, fresh from the show­er, is cas­ti­gat­ing the bush baby for ingest­ing yet again a large por­tion of the foot cream.

He is upset not only because the oint­ment tube is now almost emp­ty, but also because the bush –more

The Subterfuge

To dis­guise the fact that she is car­ry­ing the plans for the assas­si­na­tion of our town coun­cil, she decides to cross the open space between con­spir­a­cy sites wear­ing her biki­ni.  Not just any biki­ni.  The one –more

Re: Helicopter

I’ve been sum­mar­i­ly informed that because I am not at an appro­pri­ate lev­el in this orga­ni­za­tion, I do not mer­it a heli­copter in my office. Helicopter notwith­stand­ing, I have always com­port­ed –more

Peeling

Mike Hutka, when he was home from sell­ing on the road, nev­er seemed to leave his house and yard. The car stayed in the dri­ve­way day and night. “He has some sense about him­self, at least,” my moth­er said, “not –more

In no par­tic­u­lar time, you were sit­ting idly and look­ing out the win­dow, not real­ly at any­thing, and you thought, in a com­plete and audi­ble sen­tence, “I am look­ing out the win­dow.” Later, anoth­er day, you are idly look­ing –more

Somewhere along the line the cig­a­rette that we were pass­ing back and forth became my fin­ger. My fin­ger, pass­ing through into your mouth quick­ly, leav­ing damp—held firm­ly but gen­tly in between your index and mid­dle. I was –more

Empty Plinths

Daemon nev­er believed the word diaphanous could apply to stone. Once he began carv­ing souls from mar­ble after he lost his wife at the age of fifty-two to breast can­cer, how­ev­er, diaphanous became the only word –more

When my father starts bring­ing things over from the big Georgian house in Wynberg to my small cot­tage at Zeekoevlei I see trou­ble ahead. Logically, a one-room flat­let can­not con­tain the con­tents of a five-bed­roomed home where –more

The Pig Roast

One of the guests, a stout, big-haired woman in a tight-fit­ting dress, asked the head of cater­ing for the pig’s nose, which he glad­ly sev­ered with a quick chop of his cleaver. The pig, slow-cooked to the col­or –more

Telecommunications III

Last week Alexandra N. post­ed a self­ie on X.com, the every­thing web­site from which much good cheer emerges. It was a good self­ie. It fea­tured a fash­ion­able dress and a full-length mir­ror and all kinds –more

I pre­fer pick­les to naked cucumbers.
I pre­fer cats to kit­tens and kit­tens to children.
I pre­fer to sit near­est the door, though not for the rea­sons you might suspect.

I pre­fer the col­or fuch­sia to the num­ber seven.
I –more