“Memory Lane, I say; exactly

twenty years tonight. She laughs,

sips ginger ale.”

“Black varnish, marble & brass. We left California on October 1st & are now in Rosarito.”

“It all went to hell when the goats came out corkscrewed

     and killed their mother. Those kids had to be fed wheat

through the chicken-wire pen.”

“It was dark. Cold. I opened my eyes, and it was still dark. Wood at my sides. Softness in the crook of my left arm. My right hand touched a ceiling overhead.”

“The glass was cursed. That was what the twins said the morning Wahala died. They burst into my room, shrieking and bouncing on my bed like it was Christmas Day.”

“I didn’t know her, so I asked her to marry me. I did this many times.”

“When I walk under Darrell and Tabby’s wooden archway leading into their flower garden and koi pond, I hope I’m not intruding. From the rural road we all live on, I waved hello and Darrell waved back.“

“You’re in the bathroom taking the longest whiz of your life when the microwave starts hollering that your food is done…”

“Cleaver me. Leave it to Beaver me.

Beneath all of Ward's shark suits lives”

“With fingertips, I peel off the skin, then debone soft salmon flesh

the hue of autumn leaves, the late afternoon sky. “

Take a cup of organic henna powder. Yes, organic. Otherwise, you’re buying brownish-green dirt and chemicals. Of course, it’ll cost you. Beauty, after all, has a price. 

no matter why

or if, or in what way, what

I want to say is

Traveling with you is being hungry, always. We prowl the sites like jackals, waiting for our chance to jump. Hot, sugary churros chased down by beer after beer at the ancient bar behind the new colonialist temple, and the ruins of the older Aztec one where we ducked in to escape the rain and warm our July-cooled bones, and stayed until we were as dry and comfortable as the dogs we are, our conversation the only fire, and the music, and the only other people in the place another couple, she with heavy, tightly constrained hips and red, plum-red, hair.

“My boyfriend shows up at my apartment with his face made up like a hideous monster. It’s not Halloween, but he’s an amateur actor, so I’m more surprised than shocked.”

“A week after Mom leaves, Dad tells us to stop asking about her. A postcard arrives. We recognize Mom’s handwriting. Dad snatches it away.”

“I get to forty eight and stop counting. Laying each coat on the bed, shoulder to shoulder, they make a heaping, unruly camel’s back that could topple over at any moment. Again and again I return to the closet, lift out a different coat, search all the pockets, drop the hanger in the bag and spread it on the pile.”

“is wrong is a guy thing is a radical notion in the Czech Republic is the future”

“An acerbic alchemy of PBR and hormones

bubble up inside my mouth,

crammed in a theater showing My Bloody Valentine.

Drizzled spit and splatter campfire, bad decisions”

“I thought they were rocks, but they’re turtles, moving slowly over one another to sun. Stretching out their gray necks. There’s a man behind me saying, ‘did you get one of these?’ to passersby and holding out a pamphlet titled Are You a Good Person?”

“At thirteen, she’d stepped out of the forest into a place where the water was a solid sheet of green.  She was trusting then –innocent of what the color meant.”