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Grief
Poetry
What I Didn’t Say
And I didn’t say there is no philosophy of life that covers this / I didn’t say how am I supposed to breathe when you stop
May 2022Poetry
The Cardinal Reminds Me
It sweeps and arcs across my path / almost every day on my walk to the cafe, / under sun or cloud, its red / seeming lit from inside, a brightness / bold as the lipstick my mother wore
March 2022The Dog-Eared Page
Riding Out At Evening
At dusk, everything blurs and softens. / From here out over the long valley, / the fields and hills pull up / the first slight sheets of evening, / as, over the next hour, / heavier, darker ones will follow.
March 2022
Poetry
My Father’s Messages Erased From My Answering Machine
“Hi, it’s just me.” This might be the only phrase I know for sure / was on the years of messages the phone company erased / when they — inexplicably — changed my number. / The messages are gone, but the grief is still there, / ripe, a fullness I’m glad I possess. We think we want grief / to pass, but what would I do if it were gone, / like the messages, irretrievable?
February 2022Fiction
Coffins Lining The Road
I wondered if I had stumbled upon some universal principle: the more beautiful the illusion, the more egregious the lie.
February 2022
Fiction
Disclosure And Consent
I understand that though it was not my choice to listen to the Jackson 5 during the procedure, I will now think of their seminal hits every time I smell isopropyl alcohol in my vicinity.
January 2022Essays, Memoirs & True Stories
How We Met And What Happened Next
A middle-aged New England lawyer, you were dressed like a cowboy. This, as much as anything else, underscored that it was over between us. A suede-fringe jacket. Snakeskin boots with stacked heels. An oversized Stetson. What, I said, no spurs?
December 2021
Poetry
FaceTime
I held an iPad for Miguel as he lay in his hospital bed / so he could see his family sheltered at home. / He was suffocating, this man who at the worst of times / would only tell his loved ones, Me siento bien. / All around us the equipment of life / and death was buzzing, humming, beeping, / a stubborn choir of mockingbirds.
December 2021Essays, Memoirs & True Stories
Between Notes
I add thirty-eight points to Dad’s side of the scorecard. “You’re kicking my ass,” I say. He gathers the cards and begins to shuffle, his hands clumsy, the cards slipping out onto the table. “Let me,” I say, but he says he can do it, that it’s his turn.
November 2021
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