Portmanteau Prayer for Moms
lord, grant us the shelter of strangers where no one needs us to be animute, invisociable as an old retriever give us room to braid our three halves…
Dear Wallace, “You were only here because”
You were only here because at some point someone made space for you I too want a predictable home so I can do whatever I want but for…
Dear Wallace, “Many, many animals and insects”
Many, many animals and insects lay eggs and then die or give birth and die or raise their young and die when the time is come. Humans keep…
Dear Wallace, “They say mother is the boredom”
They say mother is the boredom of invention. Stripes, stripes, stripes, spots. How was it in insurance Did you talk about markets while your mind scoffed?…
Transatlantic
This alone. The man on the TSA line right in front of you, carrying caribou antlers. Yes, you drank. Yet no doubt. There he stands with the horns. And…
Rumorville
Mathematicians don’t have friends. Astrophysicists: kinky. Oceanographers: beige, stringy, often unaware of holes in their hearts. Chronologists will not shut up. Chemists: introverted onanists who wear a single suit…
Truth I Tell
—after Sara Borjas There is a footrest inside of me: lie. Everyone steps on it and never wants to leave: that is a lie. I give them water…
Marge Farrell
—after I Married a Monster from Outer Space (1958) Who giveth this woman in marriage? Outside the Wee Kirk Chapel, in my coronet of white myrtle. Then, the…
Kat Harvey
—after Casper (1995) In Friendship, Maine, in the mansion of Whipstaff I waft in eyelet lace, floor-length out the steamer trunk. There are steeples and myrtle and…
The Green Streetlight
The ineffable… I’ve walked into your trap. I went to a spring late at night and froze like an armless statue in the middle of an autumn garden. What…
Everything I Let Go of
One of us is dead. One of us sleeps in his van, parked at the curb in front of his sister’s house. I’ve just retired. In the morning…