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After The Stillbirth

Afterward, I walked in graveyards, clearing away trash and fallen branches. I pulled up weeds that obscured the names on old headstones, though most of the names I revealed meant nothing to me. I took special care with the graves of children.

Cats And Dogs

Pills blessed by the Dalai Lama, Charlotte’s secret, bodies at the bottom of the freezer

The Man Who Hated Dogs

After all these years, my father’s rich, deep voice still filled me with a mixture of fear and awe, even over the telephone, “I don’t know why you people want a dog,” he said. By “you people,” he meant not just me and my husband, but everyone everywhere who has ever had the slightest inclination to get a dog.

Old Maids

My aunt Eunice never married. I have not married either, and I think that perhaps we remained single for the same reason, though I may be wrong. Eunice never said why she hadn’t married, except in the joking way one replies to the curiosity of children.

Photographs By Gary Walts

Gary Walts had many occasions to photograph his father, Aubrey Guy Walts, who supported a family of twelve by working as a machinist for the New Jersey National Guard. In particular, Gary documented his father’s deteriorating mental health over a two-year period in the mideighties. When Aubrey Walts took his own life in 1987, Gary filed away the undeveloped negatives and didn’t retrieve them until ten years later, after a colleague’s death brought back memories.

This Moment In Time In Brooklyn

A cabby picks me up at the cabstand at La Guardia Airport, but not before I’m handed a bright yellow brochure titled Taxi Information. In three languages, the brochure lists sample fares from the airport to the city’s five boroughs. There’s also space to record the driver’s medallion and license numbers if the cabby is rude or refuses to go to a particular neighborhood — the South Bronx, for example.

When My Best Friend’s Boyfriend Died, By Taffy Smyth

When Chris died it was a shock. No one had ever really died before, although everyone in his group of friends had almost died at least a couple of times.

Oh

Selected Poems

Homage To A Sorcerer

Carlos Castaneda has died. There aren’t many to bear witness to or for him, because he didn’t allow many witnesses. One met him by invitation, usually, and even that was more fluke than not. Those invited were of all sorts. I happened to be one, for reasons that weren’t clear to me and probably aren’t important. Perhaps I was called to be a witness?