In a waiting room at the Kresge Eye Center,my fingers trace the outline of money folded into pocketand I know the two hundred fifty dollars thereis made up of two hundred forty-five I can’t afford to spendbut will spend on a calm voice to tell mehow I am to be repaired. But legally blind and…
This endless room is deep blue, dark red.I’m wearing my Valentino gown, vintage silhouettebut hand-stitched for me. It’s the same purpleas my favorite twilight, just as I requested. Everyone is here—I can see across the waythe black-rooted starlets and reality queensdrinking acai Cosmos. And I can see the disgracedcongressman studying his notes at the bar,…
In the endthere is alwaysa little changein the pockets,a few suns and moonsyou couldn’t spend. Nearbythe cloudof a would-be breathdoesn’t move,reprieved but useless. This candle will change all that. Use the last bit of air for light, and heat the hand that shields the eyes and face when it getstoo close or bright. No one…
When I change lanes on I-70 North toward the St. Louis airport, my father points to my sideview mirrors and asks how I like them angled. He tells me he keeps his tilted to show only a trace of his car, a shadow, enough to see where it ends and the asphalt picks up.And while…
That’s how much time they give you to bribe the hall of records for the paperwork you bribe the foreman to sign, swearing you know nothing and owe nothing—no loans, no debtsbefore you bribe a woman to sell your pots and pans, plates, plants, rugs, and record player, so you can bribe a dentist and…
for TP The woman down the hall has a girlfriend. When they fell in love the sea was a finger. It pushed them both in the belly. It rubbed their lips. It ran itself up and down their thighs. Then they got married. The sea came to the wedding and ate the shrimp cocktail. Had…
Before she told me, she let mefinish my dinner. I can still seethe pinkish cream sauceblossoming on the china. I didn’t know yet if I could walkwhen I pushed myself back from the table.This is what gets me:I didn’t throw the stained dish against the wall.I slipped the plastic from my wallet.I signed my name.No…
A poem about “Still Life with Fruit,Wine, Glasses, and a Bowl of Cherries,” by Hendrik van Streek, can’t stay in the painting for longunless it takes a closer look at the blue bowl holding the cherriesand wonders, as the wall label wonders,whether that’s Chinese porcelainshipped to Europe by the Dutch East India Company,or tin-glazed earthenwarefired…
He takes the bones of a pony, a pot of Earl Grey tea, a paintbrush and what remains of the bodywhere his students learned, for years, to name the parts, saying ulna, radius, tibia, skull. Saying femur, sternum, pelvis, clavicle. Is this not how god made Eve and Adam, more or less? The one from clay, the other from a rib…
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