Browse Topics
Healing
In The Quiet Room
There is nothing to remember. Pale flesh and coarse, dark hair and a mountain of a belly. Hands that lingered too long. A weight that wouldn’t move. No, nothing to remember.
May 2014
Keepsakes
A potted nandina shrub, an antique makeup compact, a light-blue cotton dress with white embroidery
February 2014
The Odds Of Injury
In rugby I find a clan of women who braid their hair tight to their scalps, who have tattoos and girlfriends and are fiercely loyal. They are my comrades on the field. They risk injury for me, and I do the same for them. Since women’s rugby is an underfunded club sport, we fight for field space, wake up early, play on the rocky public fields of Oakland.
February 2014
Show Business
It was raining outside and cold; we were in the middle of a dark November on the Lake Plains of New York State. Inside the movie theater I was drunk on cheap beer, and you were holding me.
August 2013
In Transit
My husband stands at the front of the bus, one hand clutching a rail, the other gripping a strap, his hospital gown floating below a puffy blue winter jacket.
January 2013
Low Noon
Long after our last slow day together, / say, a campfire, a walk in the woods, / getting lost and not caring
September 2012Someday Is Today
My sister’s husband died recently, and sorrow has made her a little girl again. Although she’s thirty-nine, I keep catching glimpses of her little-girl face, the one I know from old photographs and junior-high yearbooks.
September 2012
Gethsemane
When the disciple who loved Him most / unsheathed his sword / and sliced off the right ear / of the high priest’s servant, / we all cheered and stomped the parquet floor / in that February classroom
August 2012Agonizing Grace
“Do you feel you’re a danger to yourself or others?” Dr. Lyman G. Glandy, head psychiatrist at Fairview Psychiatric Hospital, wants to know. He’s interviewing me for the first time since my arrival here three days ago. We’re in my room, a small, Spartan, dimly lit chamber with all the charm of a prison cell.
October 2011
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