Hummingbirds
Mother of Pearl door, Istanbul Nails cut red sea scallops into her thumb Held back from digging deeper. What was the point? He’d shut his Facebook door Disenfranchised her from sending Text messages Seven years of speaking Every day Slammed shut silence. Read Pablo Neruda’s Lost Poems Listened to hummingbirds Chitter outside on her patio […]
Benchmarks
Memory Believes Before Knowing Remembers –William Faulkner Walk past wild radish and California golden poppies, beyond a pond lined in cattails and home to mallards, continue down a slope, an easy jog, a stretch of buckeye trees, the spring’s white candelabra, bay live oak and laurel undulate like dancers in a scrim of sunlight, journey […]
Wandering in the Desert
I want to wake up each morning without remembering your voice, how we used to wrap around together in one invisible seam, a velcro from head to toe. I want to wake up each morning knowing I’ll be okay get everything I need to get done without convincing myself for the hundredth time it’s over. […]
For Syrian Refugees
A word sings past a chime of cascading leaves flows outside a slight breeze cousin to the first breath two syllables a holy mantra bathed in cries shuttling life across the bandwidth of the universe Shalom Shalom Shalom
How We Demonize Each Other
An ancient monk wears heavy wooden prayer beads looped about his neck, koa or woodrose. White-robed, he is sworn to protect local villagers from demons. More than a few– a snow queen, and a troupe of viral bats, victim’s heads dangling from necks like spent cherry blossoms, hissing foxes that split trees wide open, but the great master […]
Pygmalion
two angels sit on steps regenerating the third a look-out for whatever got them into this mess— a rag of wings a bindle of legs angels on a goof setting off a debate whose bright idea the whole thing had been anyway, to forsake a clock tower several blocks away from where they’d offered free target […]
Ode to Aunt Elsie
I look at the walls of your town house where you lived for more than forty years and died after your hundredth birthday just as you predicted you would. I’m looking at your walls, family photographs of children and grandchildren, obligatory framed pictures of you and your husband from a marriage you endured; paintings of […]
Saguaro
Not the freaking desert, my father would rather spend his day at the beach, my mother, always in charge of food, packed egg sandwiches and a tall thermos, passed an insulated plaid bag to my uncle who cursed, took the sac anyway, and my two aunts, always ahead of the game, one negotiating rocks with […]
Visiting Hours
In a loosely gathered knot, cousins from different airports arrive at her bedside, morphine placed beneath her tongue, a liquid sacrament. Friends want her to recognize them, to repeat names, to remember how they used to spend summers together with the kids. In one moment she catches fire, the next, forgets. The children don’t know […]
Heart Poacher
I’ll tell you the story of the heart poacher, a man with a hunger for hearts. how he rides all day in a wagon looking for one that’s ripe, and when he picks it, he also washes it, a sly, bandit raccoon who takes his kill to the river. Everyone knows the heart poacher. how he does his […]