New World Writing Quarterly

RINF

I’m open­ing anoth­er before I’m fin­ish­ing, with no reli­able inter­net, with a paper­clip to up & down the zip­per on my green coat, with you except you’re not you & you’re wher­ev­er you are, in an apart­ment full of me & my qui­ets, –more

Self-Portrait as a Turkey Vulture

Must be some kind of man’s vertigo-
I’m Judy, I’m Madeleine, I’m Marilyn
Monroe in a black bobbed wig.
O Periphas, I’ve been your wife in bed,
a sign as pure as dove’s feath­ers, purer
than bat­tery acid. But this is what –more

Carpenters ham­mer below the shad­ed win­dow. I rise from bed, light a cig­a­rette, and walk to the win­dow. The stony street dis­plays the still­ness on which build­ings stand. It isn’t pos­si­ble to be young again, yet a com­mon light bathes the cob­ble­stones. Time is the fire in which we all burn. See this win­dowsill? It shines with its lip of snow. White pieces drift past the cold pane, the small­est col­or of the small hours. Early morn­ing has begun with­out us, and yet we are here. What am I now that I was not then? Somewhere down the street a car coughs, stut­ters, ignites. The day will fall of its own weight. The mys­tery of begin­ning, resumes.

~

Gary Percesepe is the author of eight books, most recent­ly The Winter of J, a poet­ry col­lec­tion pub­lished by Poetry Box. He is Associate Editor at New World Writing. Previously he was an assis­tant fic­tion edi­tor at Antioch Review. His work has appeared in Christian Century, Maine Review, Brevity, Story Quarterly, N + 1, Salon, Mississippi Review, Wigleaf, Westchester Review, PANK, The Millions, Atticus Review, Antioch Review, Solstice, and oth­er places. He resides in White Plains, New York, and teach­es phi­los­o­phy at Fordham University in the Bronx. 

My moth­er got me start­ed on t’ai chi when I was a lit­tle kid, no more than five or six, I think.  We used to go togeth­er to her class on Thursday nights at the ele­men­tary school gym.  She sort of dragged me along.

The man who taught us was grace­ful, –more

Everything could have been dif­fer­ent, yet all remains the same. For years Batgirl cir­cled the globe, her eyes pud­dled with tears. Euripides, I’m told, despite his fame, clipped toe­nails in soli­tude. What I mean to say is, be patient with me, I’m –more

A moth­er whose chil­dren go to my child’s school mes­saged me and four oth­er moth­ers from the school because she was in a quandary. Corinne is her name. As most of us knew, Corinne said, she didn’t have a good rela­tion­ship with her sis­ter, who could –more

All that sum­mer my broth­er, Kevin, padded around the house in the Pink Panther cos­tume my aunt had made him for his birth­day: pink paja­mas for the body and a match­ing tie for the tail. The paja­mas were thick and sort of vel­veteen. Despite the fact –more

“Yep, just fish­ing for some tires,” said the fish­er­man. “I only need four. I’ll catch one, one day, and then I’ll only need three more. I’ll catch them, as well. Tires, they float by like glac­i­ers. Like worn, rub­ber glac­i­ers, and I only –more

In the four months since my hus­band died, I dreamt of him only twice. In the first dream, he ate berries, reclin­ing in a shad­owy room while our girls played on the floor. What a thrill to see him eat­ing. No tumor block­ing the way. No feed­ing tube. –more

Sumi waits out­side the dorm for thir­ty min­utes before Mary, a fel­low grad stu­dent, shows up. They’re late for the brain­storm­ing ses­sion at Wray’s house.

The radio in Mary’s car crack­les, vol­ume on high since the win­dows don’t roll up. There’s a grassy –more

Carol brought the baby home and put him in the bassinet, then sat on the edge of the bed star­ing at him. He slept peace­ful­ly while she toyed with a loose thread on the flo­ral quilt. She was young, but not fool­ish, and she, along with her hus­band, Dan, –more

We were half way through the sec­ond course before she men­tioned it. Quite in pass­ing. Not that she came out and said it direct­ly. Just in pass­ing as if it was some­thing I already knew. Something like oh my hus­band would have done such and such or my –more

Like a Tranquil Island

Of course I ran out of time, just barely
begun before I had to board, right as
I dis­cov­ered at last the best part of
the city, the place where the artists were
thriv­ing, paint­ing their win­dow frames pur­ple,
–more

It’s my nine­teenth birth­day and I’m swim­ming with ten friends in a quar­ry when this old man with a big beard comes charg­ing across the lawn. He’s one of those tall guys who makes him­self seem taller by walk­ing stooped, like he’ll become gigan­tic –more

THE HEART IS A JUNK DRAWER

Each sec­ond can be a new begin­ning. Let’s crawl into the back seat and make rough sense to each oth­er. Read epis­to­lary love nar­ra­tives by the oven light. Tell you my sto­ry using let­ters? Sounds like every sto­ry to me.

I haunt –more

He mea­sured life in years and fifty-two had gone. Sometimes he thought, on a dif­fer­ent scale, one dri­ven by a num­ber that val­ued rich­ness and ful­fill­ment, but that num­ber was too low for his lik­ing. He had done lit­tle worth remem­ber­ing, and since it –more

We are pleased to announce that effec­tive imme­di­ate­ly, writer Tamara Grisanti will be tak­ing over all NWW social media activ­i­ty, chiefly on Facebook and Twitter. As a for­mer and future con­trib­u­tor, we are delight­ed to have her with us going forward.

The White Sheet

The dead come to me vul­ner­a­ble, shar­ing their sto­ries and secrets. Here is my scar. Touch it. Here is the roll of fat I always hid under that big sweater, and now you see. This is the per­son I’ve kept pri­vate, afraid of what peo­ple –more

Mattie clutched her bag. She clutched her bag so hard her arms tensed and ached. Her bag was a sea foam green that she want­ed to squeeze the col­or out of. The pain in her arms from the squeez­ing didn’t com­pare to the ache, the throb in her temples.

She –more

I was meet­ing the man who pre­vi­ous­ly owned the house I now called home. After mov­ing out of the house, almost imme­di­ate­ly, his wife died of a brain aneurysm. His chil­dren were now grown and at col­leges on dif­fer­ent coasts. It had been a few years. –more