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Parents
Don’t Think Too Hard about Avocados
It’s the brown spots that worry me, the ones that appear on the edge of the avocado after you leave half in the refrigerator. Harmless or no? . . . I’m not talking about overall browning, though. I’m talking about distinct dark spots speckling the flesh. Are they brown or black? I’ve never been very good with colors.
February 2024
Fantasy
Calling a 1-900 number, moving to the tropics, writing fan fiction
February 2024
Anger Management
Dr. B. spun a finger in the air, his signal to let the games begin. I think I called Michael a “no-good fucking loser,” a put-down one of my bosses had once leveled at me. I watched Michael’s hands form fists and the whites of his eyes get bigger.
January 2024
Lumps of Coal
He was ten and drove a team of mules / through the shadows in mine shafts, / pulling a wagonload of coal / that glinted in the carbide light / anchored to his cotton cap.
December 2023Basements
I was considered “good,” considered a “good influence.” It amazed me — like the cool feeling of Marshall’s tongue on my labia had amazed me — that I could possess all of these qualities; that I could be both warm and cold, virtuous and defiant; and that someone could love me for all of it.
December 2023
His Body Of Work
I loved my father’s body. It worried me, too. . . . I didn’t know what polio was, but it sounded scary, and he had survived it. This helped form my view of him as someone who could survive almost anything. Like Wile E. Coyote, he might get hurt and maimed, but he never, ever gave up.
November 2023
This Little Bit I Am Trying To Hold
Poems About Departures
Listen to the poets in this month’s special poetry section read their poems about leaving and letting go. To listen, click the play button below each title in the article.
I will leave you, / and I will / leave the sudden // darkness of afternoon thunderstorms / and I will leave / the rain and its patience in shaping mountains
— from “I Will Leave,” by Michael Bazzett
I am here to translate my father’s death / into fruit. Something that can be held. To bring / it up to your lips the way I spooned strawberry / yogurt up to his and said to him the word “Eat.” / There was no use, in the end. There was no hunger.
— from “I Did What I Could to Keep This,” by Peter Markus
Tonight, because all matter is dissolving, you & I / are being gradually undressed by the universe — // silk & wool molecules mingling with cells / rising from skin like souls
— from “Everything,” by Terry Lucas
November 2023Gratitude
A second chance at work, a shared meal in the classroom, a helpful stranger at a rest stop
November 2023
