June 2009
2 posts
11. Crossing
They leave early on a Monday morning, slipping out of doorways and sliding around corners. They head out of the city. They head toward the mountains, where the sun is thrusting out threads of color, pushing pinks and oranges into the blue of the sky. The path through forests, through birdcalls and cracking branches and leaves that crunch beneath their feet. They stumble through streams, through...
10.
There is something about the way the road cuts through the forest that makes her sad, something about that one hollow of hard concrete and had sunlight between the gentle filter of the tree tops. There is something about the rumble of motors, the tough toll of tires against blankets of pine needles, something about the rain tossed aside by windshield wipers. There is something about the direct...
May 2009
1 post
9. So Much Depends Upon
There are days when she’s ready to leave. There’s not much here, really, that’s worth even a few more months. It’s not even scary anymore, not even strange or intimidating. It’s not even new, not anymore, when she’s imagined it for years. It’s still exciting, still different, she hopes. She images there are still things she can’t imagine. But if she...
April 2009
2 posts
Atlantis -- A Lost Sonnet
How on earth did it happen, I used to wonder
that a whole city — arches, pillars, colonnades,
not to mention vehicles and animals — had all
one fine day gone under?
I mean, I said to myself, the world was small then.
Surely a great city must have been missed?
I miss our old city —
white pepper, white pudding, you and I meeting
under fanlights and low skies to go home in...
8.
She would be the color blue. There are all kinds of shades of blue: blue like her Grandma’s bedroom, light and fresh; blue like her bedspread, dark and calm; blue like the sky over her house in the summer, endless and unchanging. She would be blue like the ocean. Not the kind of light, clear blue of waves that wash up on white sand beaches. She would be deep blue, a little greenish, the color of...
March 2009
10 posts
“Doesn’t it worry you, packing all that life together? What if a meteor...”
– So You Want to Be a Wizard- Diane Duane
7.
About half of her pens leak on her hands and the other half are covered with bite marks. And she’s not depressed, really. She’s just sad, sometimes, because she’s half-in-love and there’s pretty much no chance things’ll ever change. (And she just can’t seem to shake it; she’s tried and tried but it doesn’t go away.)
6.
Halfway between midnight and morning, she falls in love. She’s not surprised, really, ‘cause she’s spent the last ten years of her life life falling in and out of love, from her huge crush on the boy with the black curls who sat next to he rin first grade to the moment she glances over and her eyes catch on him, silhouetted in the faint reflections from the street lights....
5.
She loves the late nights, slipping into his chambers when everyone is asleep. She loves the smooth glide of her fingers over his calloused skin. She loves the way he whispers to her, talks low into her skin. She loves the way she feels beneath him, protected. She loves the way he always knows when something’s wrong, what she does when she’s nervous. She loves the way his face lights up when she...
4.
She misses early mornings, slipping out of his chambers when the sky’s still dark. She misses the rough slide of his fingers over her skin. She misses the way he yields to her voice, like no one else’s. She misses the way he feels above her, invincible. She misses how he tries to hide things from her, twisting his hands and clearing his throat. She misses his laugh and his soft hair slipping...
3.
There’s something about driving through the country that makes her sad, something about the hard concrete and hard sunlight twisting through the miles of green grass, past the small towns and lonely houses. There’s something about the road she’s driven so many times, between there and everywhere else, that reminds her things will never be right again.
***
She didn’t think she’d die so young, but...
2.
I don’t think you remember but the wind was strong, tangling my hair in my face and throwing sand against my back. My legs were sticky with salt water and I was the only one who wasn’t scared. Little drops of melted ice ran down your feet and sunk into the sand. I could barely speak to make you feel better. You waded into the tall grass and I wandered off to take off my bathing suit....
1.
I’m writing you because we’re both older now and I don’t see you anymore. Do you remember late summer afternoons, just before dinner, on your front lawn? The ground was still damp from the sprinklers. Your mom would make us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and I don’t even like jelly, but I ate them anyway. My hair was wet and tangled from the pool and your skin was dark...