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Sunbeams

That sudden and ill-timed love affair may be compared to this: you take boys somewhere for a walk; the walk is jolly and interesting — and suddenly one of them gorges himself with oil paint.

Anton Chekhov

Sunbeams

The lure of quantity is the most dangerous of all.

Simone Weil

Selected Poems

little pictures

as a small child, i did not know how to unzip myself. my parents never talked about it. when i was fourteen my father “accidentally” left out a book on his desk called “what to tell your child about unzipping.”

Sight

The raggediest fisherman at the farthermost lake in the most distant corner of a country at the edge of the world went fishing one day when it was neither sunny nor cloudy, neither fair nor foul.

Sadly This Clay

Family Portraits

I am mesmerized by the photograph of my father, staring at me from solemn dark eyes just like mine. He is dressed splendidly in a striped suit and white shoes; I cannot tell the colors of anything else because the faded sepia tones of the photograph reflect only subdued lights and darks. A dandy, my father was, with a handkerchief in his pocket and a flower in his lapel, his dark hair perfectly parted on the side. There is an anger in the way he stands, and a shyness; the look on his face is sullen and inviting.

The Words Left Unsaid

Words alone had not knitted us together; neither could silence tear the fabric. I remember a crisp fall afternoon when I started to tell my mother that I loved her, that seeing her suffer was more pain than I could bear, that — she held out her arms to stop me. “Don’t speak,” she said, “or we’ll both cry.”

Those Nights

The Pulse

He is in the pulse, pulsing, pulsing. He is where he belongs, where he is held, so loved. Why did he ever fight this? “Ever have I loved you,” not quite a voice, but he hears it, knows it.