The neurologist says the tissue is friable—a word I don’t know. I picture hissing oil, onion-tears. My grandfather tells me it means thin, easily broken. He seems to know…

  Does a match also serve to shed light on a given subject? what if it casts doubt, the light, instead of offering answers? what if the minimal light of…

  Comfort is important whether we remember it or not they say children never appreciate their parents enough they are right. We never forget the right things we write about…

  On the bayou there’s no one to sing to but the birds it is for them you feel sometimes a song in yourself pushing against your mind from your…

  I buried the seeds of my ancestors in the next generation but a blight took the harvest and rodents stole the granary walls from what they held now a…

  Visiting rural Tennessee, I lie awake in a small motel at the edge of a small town, the night throbbing with sounds so robust it seems impossible they could…

  In 2005 I was walking in Louisville, and a guy shouts out, “The TV’s watching you!” People are continually giving me things that I don’t know what to do…

  Suddenly everyone’s friendly. We’re working in the front yard, Boyd and I, and our neighbor who’s never spoken to us calls out, “good job!” And now we’re talking. She’s…

  Mother’s tears are sick to death. Father’s   eyes too small to see. Sister’s eyes are somewhere   else and brothers’ eyes believe it. House’s lamps   are out.…

  I sing the girls little songs while every plant in the house dies.   In group, they say into a microphone: “Today we have learned coping skills.” I cannot…

  Cancer is a cancer is a cancer invading Publix check-out lines. Cashiers ask you to make a donation for it. There are 84 movies on IMDb that have patients…