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  • village night

    this is the first night no morning comes no morning nudges noon no lateday sunset collects in evening’s cistern; festival rot rusts flowerpetals down open sewers, cobblestones fasten echoes of haytime frivolity; early smell of snow gives everyone harvest jitters and the trees fake light while the moon hides under an unloaded wagon all night…

  • Hannah

    I walk on hooked rugs; my beds are covered with patchwork. Across the road they sell corn and red beans—fresh picked, and the milk in bottles has a layer of cream an inch thick at the top. This was my father’s home I have come back to. My elderly cousin is working her latest jig-saw…

  • The Train Wreck

    When it snows after a train wreck, I like the people to crawl out and celebrate a little, to think about winter. I like it when they open their battered suitcases and dedicate some clothing to the wind, or when they build a fire and huddle around it, singing . . . Why should they…

  • Full Moons

    The first full moon I wanted to take a taxi home — we were that far apart. The second full moon tides pulled at the beach of our vacation.      We made love in a room we couldn’t afford but that had a view. The third full moon you were too tired so we watched television….

  • The Arsonist

    By the end of this story, the house next door should be in flames, but that may never happen. In his dream, there is no house. Instead, he has stolen the blueprints. He ignites them with a handful of matches. And now the dream has already changed. It has nothing to do with fire. He…

  • The Toll of Industry

    He’s out of work, he naps Extravagantly, his lines of credit Tighten, his boundaries dissolve, he’s So hung up on her, he counts The rows of wire squares on his screen Windows, he counts Eyelashes, he counts the hours or days Until he sees her Until she breaks the date And he starts again from…

  • The Earth Swept Clean

    The earth swept clean of creatures not its own: earth, ocean, air, to you do we belong only? No! The long climb up from slime turning on a dime      remains, hanging on by a thread to the dead generations, lowly, encapsulated though once I read in TIME, that wisdom of the week we twitchy moderns…