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Fiction
In My Father’s Arms
My keeper hurled me into the hole, and jumped in after me. She pulled the floorboards back into place, over our heads, and we were engulfed in darkness as the hammering against the front door started. I tried to call out, but her thick arm snaked around my chest, and her calloused palm clamped over my mouth, as the sound of wood splintering, and then crashing, exploded all around us.
July 1991A Meeting
A woman sitting alone raises her glass and smiles. This has never happened to Rabbi Feltman before. He is not sure how to react. After a moment he decides to nod in acknowledgment and raises his own glass.
June 1991Bodhisattva
She saw clearly that God was physical, that God excluded nothing from His being, that there was no sensation or perception but that God was the sensation, perception, and the very consideration of these things.
June 1991Bodies
I fell in love and then I went shopping for groceries. We were out of everything. There was milk and cold cereal. Bread. Boring.
June 1991The Path of God
I write that name with hesitation, the pause that accompanies reverence. One does not scribble the name of the Creator casually. One does not toss about the title of the Segmented Deity without a shuddering respect.
June 1991Beating Off In Mexico
It bothers me to age; I won’t deny that. I am bothered by what time does to my notions of invincibility. I am not bothered by the inability to remember — but by the inability to forget.
May 1991Sonderkommando
“The Holocaust is boring, honey. I lost it with that last Louis Malle film. It’s as old as platform shoes. They trivialize it.” Carla isn’t Jewish. “You oppress yourself, honey.” I nodded.
May 1991It Is Summer And I Paint My Toenails Magenta
It is summer. I sit on the balcony and paint my toenails magenta. Last year, I painted them cerise, Peter’s favorite color. The year before, my toes bloomed baby pink in honor of Angela, my daughter.
May 1991The Hardest Of Hands
I see her push away the dinner plate slowly, with the same painstaking attention she uses to hide the letters from her father. She zealously guards his reputation; if I threaten it, she throws a rope around my neck and pulls.
May 1991Gopher
The old man is sitting in his newest hole, a big one, half-concealed by the hedge. I squat beside it as he explores the dirt with his hands. Our lawn is a rough and violent landscape; everywhere there are angry holes, wounds that are unable to heal.
April 1991
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