The stars are pretty. I guess. “Sundown” by Gordon Lightfoot is lovely. I suppose. I’m sitting here on top of Dad’s car, looking up at the stars, on the side of a street that passes my old high school on a cold September night. I look up in the skies and wonder if Jair can see me. I wonder if he’s smiling at me, or if he’s concerned that I stole Dad’s car to come out here while having an emotional crisis. Jair Cruz was my brother. Ever since he was eight years old, this cop had come to school to tell us the importance of listening to our parents and not joining gangs. Jair wanted to be a cop. After much training and patience, he graduated from the police academy back in 2016.…
Back then, the seller told me that it’s made of a buffalo’s horn, (didn’t I know then that it wasn’t a cool idea?) and would last a hundred years or more (though I didn’t get the connection). Its base came off in five months, and I had to fix it on a block of wood. The two carved birds, with intricate details, eyelids and all, could have elevated it to a pure work of art but for their perch, a stunted tree branch that looks like a cross between an uninspiring schistose structure and concrete. I still like to look at the birds when I wake up, to reflect on their gaze upwards, as if they’re looking eternally at a taller tree branch, or for some rain that falls slanted in the dry wind to rekindle a horn that’s not dead yet in their core, breathing a glow to those eyes
Author’s Note: My poems are inspired by the sensory and emotional experiences of individuals who negotiate the political and ideological spaces they live in.…
Take the plunge Head first into the rich lanolin Twenty gallon bags of many wools, waiting
The three day workshop: A roomful of women and fleece Spinning wheels set, a teacher from New Zealand
To craft woolen and worsted Short draft, long draft, twists to Crimp and staple— The wool cards are plied, combs straightened and The ditz comes to play— Cute as a button in horn, center holed for the finishing top— As fiber is spun on hypnotic wheels Mingled talk and laughter
We plunge, hands first into the skeins of warm water Pull out strands of wet yarn Into the outdoors, draped O’s on the bushes A calligraphy of branch to weave
(Do you know that homeowner is the only instance of the word meow in the dictionary that doesn’t relate to the cat noise.)
Welcome to 163 Oak Street. Please enjoy this bottle of wine and a $50 gift certificate to Luigi’s down the street. The pizza from there is just okay, but it’s fast and cheap and it will do for the average Thursday evening dinner when your whole family has a project or meeting due the next day and everyone is cranky as hell about it.
I think you should be able to leave gifts for the people who replace you when you move. If houses had souls (and who knows, maybe they do) the gifts would ease the transition between occupants.…
Kevin has cut his hand, and it’s really bleeding, pooling into the sink as the water cascades onto his fingers from the kitchen faucet. He’s not panicked though, it’s just stinging as he holds it underneath the spout; the rapids rush, masking the sides of his fingers, and he can barely see the wound, just the streaks of red that ruddle the water. It’s rather mesmerizing though, watching the water pass, millions of harmonized droplets falling at once, synchronizing as it pours, and Kevin forgets he’s even wounded, for a moment.
Gazing at the hand soap dispenser that sits on the edge of the sink, Kevin fixates on the buoyant sun sticker affixed to the front of the bottle inscribed with “Antibacterial” in bubble letters; the first three letters darkened with dampness, making “bacterial” most discernible; he notices its corner curled, peeling from moisture until his focus blurs, and for some reason, he can feel the sunlight from the SoftSoap label tingling down his neck.…
