Favonius
You wonder what else can happen, now that snowdrops spangle the high pastures in the Merla days and you can wade the Great River in mid-Lent. Now that the winter spirits have vanished, fled without notice, to end up annulled in the absolute freeze of outer space. What will the May hay bring along? As you wonder this, and more, ... Read More
All That’s Fit for Letting Go
I donât take up too many pandemic hobbies but one of my distractions from the many kinds of grieving is reading physics books. I fail to understand them for the most part, the content too dense, the words mostly impenetrable. But I like how small it makes me feel. I donât mind how unsurmountable the sentences are. It reminds me ... Read More
The Zipper
You switch on cable news at lunch, a peanut butter and honey sandwich. Youâre watching as much to see what the Anchor is wearingâ today, a structured designer A-line white dress. A zipper down the front, a sense of professionalism hinted with sex (the zipper) and then the newsâan ex-President, a future President, a war, more candidates, the election is ... Read More
The Witnesses
David Mellin was his real name, but we all called him Melon Head. Junior had hung that cartoonish moniker upon him on the very first day of camp for good reason, in our view. With a massive ovular head resting uneasily atop a chubby little torso, Melon Head looked like a cartoon character. He had pale, almost translucent skin, with ... Read More
The Spider in the Funeral Parlor
The spider does not recognize the woman as human as it crawls across her stiff, starched collar en route
Donut Shop
In the dream youâre an off-duty cop at a counter holding up a cruller as the waitress pours your coffee.
My Date with Red Shorts
1989 Unlock your bodyâs potential the voiceover tells you to look at the sculpted man arched across the Soloflex bench,
Motherâs Day
1 I remind my daughter to make her mother a card for Motherâs Day. Something nice, I say, make it
My Brother
A giant bed. A giant man, lying. A plate on his chest. Life to be devoured. Record player bumping across
Judge rules bees are fish
The California Supreme Court left in place a lower-court decision holding that bees are fishâat least for the purpose of
Plastic Vision
For seven years of my childhood, age three until fifth grade, it has been scientifically confirmed that I had a
Remembering Charles
My brother Charles comes to me in a recurring dream. Adult me enters the infirmary through a window and like
Egg and Expectation
The carton is where old poem fragments go
lines and rhymes lacking aplomb now paper pulp
formed into function and
How To Feel Better About Your Death
SoâŚwhat do you remember about being in the womb before you were born? Do you remember the fluid? The umbilical
Interview with CL Bledsoe
MLR: Greetings, Cort. Thanks so much for chatting with me. This interview is âasynchronous,â as it were, but this is
Independence Day
I met Christine on my flight back from Berlin while helping her restrain an unruly passenger. In her crisp flight
Autumn SaudadeÂ
Weight on my chest â afternoons empty of light. Sullen processions clog this street of days. Even my pen refuses