LACUNA

 Entwined branches scraped across the larger of the windows like shriveled hands clawing their way into something precious while gusts of wind howled angrily through the corridors. Solomon Charnel lay in his bed so still, that one would think him to be lifeless. A cold, sleeping statue he was when it came to resting. But […]

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 I am an eighty-three year old woman. I have lived a very basic but at the same time complex life. Like every other person in their eighty’s, I can say with confidence that I have seen many things in my life. I have seen my children grow up. I have seen my children produce their […]

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 Most pets we’d had growing up died relatively soon after buying or receiving them and had uneventful departures from my life.   My family had had a dog, which we got rid of since he occasionally ran down the planks from our backyard fence and subsequently was caught by the “animal-catchers” (which always sounded so terrible) […]

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The linoleum is hard and cold against my cheek. I wake with the taste of blood. I do not know how long I have lain here, but it is dark. The pain through my body cuts like knives when I move. I crawl across the bathroom floor, unable to get up. When I reach […]

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Slowly the rice noodles slide into my throat, slipping past my tongue, nearly unnoticed. The sweet barley miso tingles in my cheeks. I sift the scallions from the tofu and press them to pulp with my tongue.
I am not feeling Japanese, even with the green tea stinging my mouth and Yo-Yo Ma tickling my ears. […]

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Need a ride?
He’s drunk but I am cold, tired and not about to argue with myself. I get in, fasten my seatbelt, and pray to a god I’ve never seen. Fear makes me pious. I try to ignore his erratic driving focusing instead on the snow blowing against the headlights. I am grateful to […]

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We were trudging through the wet snow of a late February. We carried with us an odd assortment of tools: a hammer, an old hand drill, buckets, spigots, hooks, and covers. It was the beginning of sugaring season. The three of us were setting trees to gather sap.
The birds were beginning to return and the […]

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He walked in the door, the same white door, into the same white office, to go to the same gray cubicle. Nothing ever seemed to change, even the pictures of his family, reminding him why he was here, were four years old. Same boss, same coworkers, only two of them friends. It didn’t matter how […]

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From the moment my favorite aunt clasped my tender, pubescent hands in her own, outstretched my arms and excitedly proclaimed, “My Goodness! Look how you’ve filled out!” I have been in the throes of a tormented relationship with my breasts. I was twelve, standing amidst the fervor of family-reunion chatter and reminiscence. But suddenly the […]

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Intro
“Thank you.” Two simple words, yet when told together, in that order, they mean so much. Just those words, said to someone, makes them feel good, it makes them feel as though they did something right, and it makes them feel appreciated. So you would see my surprise when a trashcan thanked me for […]

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