poetry

  Like the Chukar Partridge of 1931— they were dying in hunting grounds: ++++++a black necklace wrapped around their white cheek & throat. Each gun shot, a force of adrenaline & static heartbeat. ++++++The fledgling sandy brown & naked. Eyes … Read More

  When I use a mirror ++++++See how the sting lingers ++++++++++++++++++++++++in my body. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++It mocks each lift of my arm ++++++the hiding flesh ++++++++++++jagged, pale. Each startle of skin ++++++++++++now, a flight of geese. When I trace my lips … Read More

  For the first time, I am digging in the new yard I never wanted, its soil unbroken for decades, now webbed with roots from trees felled and shredded long ago. I’m sick of beginnings. When young, I knew the … Read More

  Many people, myself included, profess fondness, though once I ripped them out by the handful. What was I thinking, that afternoon and those ten years? Now when my mother has a big birthday. Now as I do the very … Read More

  —after Natalie Shapero For any thing that is in nature, a thing also that needs it. Continents apart, scientist have filmed the tender proboscides of moths feeding on birds’ sleeping tears. A lifetime of tears. We are filled & … Read More

  Enter…the QUEEN with SUFFOLK’S head —Henry VI How long did I lie in the pool of my own life before you brought me to your lips? There was a moment I rolled away from you and the breathing, the … Read More

  For months afterwards, I don’t long for wildness. I listen less to songs than their chord progressions, read only Agatha Christie novels, set rigid rules about when to sleep and eat. Fragile and ashamed like a dark yellow yolk, … Read More

  My new roommate’s car is a no man’s land of things that belonged to an ex-husband and his ex-wife. My roommate, the mutual neutral friend, patiently ferries these objects across town, brokering, listening, shielding each from the presence of … Read More

  —Christopher, 1974–1995 We’re walking on the interstate at night, in a downpour that leaves us dry Pushing through slashes of lacquered acrylic, pressed back by a wind I can’t feel In the rain, the lamplight slithers strips of light, … Read More

  I’m always rinsing something in the sink. At night, nursing bra unhooked, I press lanolin onto a fingertip. No one will ever take care of me again. Before I leaked tides of you, clear and slippery waters, unmooring, slowly … Read More

  Shipworms were chewing the wood supporting the pier containing Frank Sinatra Park. Small beer, you might say; no beer, I might answer. Soon the pier would be soluble, the phenomenon of its destruction preserved in archives of The New … Read More