All I have is a list, a promise of 11% back, and an unwieldy cold wet metal cart into which I throw the too-big chainsaw gloves for men, the joint compound to hold naked seams together. I’m trying to reconstruct true north. In the garden center aisle with the grass seed, dozens of little birds … More The Birds of Menard’s II
Finally I drive away from that old house in the city where drama was spooling out across the little screen I held: alcohol, of course, family wounds, threats of suicide. I pocket that silenced screen like a take-out container of active angst – and I go to Menard’s, where I hear you can save big … More The Birds of Menard’s – I, uncut
Scientists say that distance equals speed times time but our universes collided and sailed a million miles apart even though the erosion of our hearts was glacial – each breath a tiny wave against the ruddy shore, each heartbeat washing itself away a little more. They say that speed is distance divided by time, but … More Valentine’s Day Worksheet
Out in a windswept January night under the black quilt of sky that is tucked tightly over the Keweenaw peninsula, the stone foundation of a barn lies unsleeping; instead she’s feeling, like a phantom limb, the heft and surety of the hay mow, the ache of splintered barn boards, the impatience of the rusted tractor, … More Phantom Limb
Alone I went, I went alone to the rollicking Christmas tree farm; the saw was sharp, sharp was the saw that tucked itself under my arm – I felled a tree, the tree now mine and i cradled it there in the snow men swaddled it tight with loops of twine and i stood it … More Alone I Went
The ferryman carried me, (married, me), buried me there in the Underworld, he spied me and pried me, (belittled and mocked, me) beat down and rocked, I was round I was ground into hardwood floors, wanting no more; so as I lay dying, as I was lying in that boat’s greasy water, so sorry to … More Charon’s Younger Brother Brings Me Back Across the River Styx
I have staked out a sliver of an acre in this king-sized country where I am held carefully in the dark like the opening quotes and the first few words of a song – through the open window I can hear the world as it grows lighter, I hear sandhill cranes trilling to each other … More Suspension
Moon waxing gibbous/ in cotton candy twilight;/ ravenous, my heart/
the queen is dead long live the queen I kneel in the twilight river my knees on the sand I plunge myself under and break the surface to the north I baptize myself I am a new creation the water rolling into the water the water taking the water back again the light shattering across … More coronation
Consider the fullness, the halfness, the bare dented space on my ring finger as I hold the pint, the sun and the foam sliding down the insides of my glass. O regard the Great Pandemic! The maskers and the anti-vaxers, the moats we’ve dug around ourselves – it’s far from over, but nevertheless when I … More Behold This Pint of Oatmeal Cream Ale
Halfway North 