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“Perpetual care,” Mama emphasized. “No weeds growing over you or your loved ones when there’s nobody left to weed. (This was a comment on the fact that none of us had given her any grandchildren — no grave-weeders in her future, or “perpetuity,” as she was now calling it. Perpetuity was a concept Mama had latched onto like a snapping turtle.)
By Marjorie KemperJuly 2010A ten-day camping trip, a blond wig tucked inside a plastic bag, Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers
By Our ReadersJuly 2010My father saved people’s lives for a living. It was his job; if he hadn’t been there all those hundreds of nights in the ER, it would’ve been someone else who saved them — some other mortal man or woman sanctified by the white coat and stethoscope, living on too much coffee and too little sleep, required to look self-assured as bleeding, broken, screaming bodies were wheeled in over and over, night after night.
By Judith JoyceJuly 2010Mother came to visit today. We / hadn’t seen each other in years. Why didn’t / you call? I asked. Your windows are filthy, she said.
By Mark IrwinJuly 2010Just give me the good news this morning, and let me hear it sung! I want glorious cantatas. I want soaring arias. I want the music of the spheres ringing in my ears.
By Sy SafranskyJune 2010“What is money after all?” said Mr. Dombey, backing his chair a little, that he might the better gaze in sheer amazement at the presumptuous atom that propounded such an inquiry.
By Charles DickensJune 2010The gal looked young in the body and old in the face standing alongside I-80 with a flowered suitcase held over her head to block the sun. Stop! Darrell said when we drove by her, but Jake didn’t take his foot off the gas. She’s not such a looker, gentle Glenn whispered. He was by me in the back seat. They all look the same when they’re talking to your johnson, Darrell told him. He rolled his window down and hung his head out to stare at her disappearing shape.
By Laurel LeighJune 2010Holding a black wire coat hanger in his hand, / bending a loop in the tip with a pair of pliers, / my neighbor Mr. Alvarado is walking down his drive
By Tony HoaglandJune 2010A long embrace, the look of freedom, a riderless horse
By Our ReadersJune 2010In the night I spoke of my father again / how he vanished suddenly
By Lou LipsitzMay 2010Personal, political, provocative writing delivered to your doorstep every month—without a single ad.
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