Poetry

That glass of wine suspended in airdecades ago—3D projection still a tactilememory, the ruby liquid shimmeringas if just poured into its goblet,the hands reaching out,all of us incredulous then believingbefore this chalice raised to science and art. And now in Japan, rising pop divacat girl Hatsune Miku—high-def,green-haired avatar—“sings”synthesized pop in huge stadiums,bloodless and breathlessfor thousands…

On the morning she became a young widow,my grandmother, startled by a sudden shadow,looked up from her work to see a hawk turnher prized rooster into a cloud of feathers.That same moment, halfway around the worldin a Minnesota mine, her husband died,buried under a ton of rockfall.She told me this story sixty years ago.I don’t…

I’ve watched this ultrasound so oftenI close my eyes and picture a daughter feathered with pixels,a putto’s skeleton. So here is a piece of art I own, a representationany impressionist would be proud of for it moves, though it doesn’t yetmove me. But I do return, so she has achieved what a painting wants:to be…

The sun was nothing more than an orangethe day Lisa ran for the ice cream truck.It was small and even if it held sweetness,even if it seeped Vitamin C, it couldn’t stopthe car from barreling down Mott Avenue,couldn’t shine enough to show the driver the eight-year-old girl dashing in front of his Pontiac so that…

I go around and turn the pages—the newestnews—for the paralytics on the porch.At least the day isn’t hot yet. So saysonly a gleam in an old man’s eye. A beezeroes in for the kill. I roll the ladiesto the shady side. No one wants wordof war. They go for a strangled baby on page three,continued…

When I decide to go to hear Handel’s Messiah in London          at the composer’s parish church, my husband sayshe’d rather see a Thai horror movie, so we plan to meet later          at our favorite Moroccan lair that serves huge platters of olives and fried goat brains, but here I am sitting in the pew           next to the…

do you remember that bumyou ran into in the bathroom of the Radissonwashing himself with a rag his clothes in a pilein the corner he must have been in his sixtiesall smiles and still retarded by his father’s rageoh this man he said the things he didto me and my mother you wouldn’t believethey made…

Valium, Librium, and Tylenol with codeine—that’s what Velma           the head nurse at the Florida House of Representatives would dish out when you came in with your period, a hangover,           a cold, a broken arm, a hangnail. She called it the Triple,as in It sounds like you need a Triple or That calls for a Triple.          God,…

Your grandfather and I walk alike,each of us counting the brittle spacesin getting older. At the desk I explainI want to see my son, and I see youare now digits on a sheet. Blackmen in black—the brothers—make sureyou obey the rules. It is like the timesI had to come to school to get youfor being…