When the Room Turned
When she was three days old, I called him. It was still dark out, that pre-dawn haze when even your own breathing sounds unfamiliar. Home from the hospital, I sat on the edge of my bed in my postpartum diaper, bleeding through a pad, the baby latched to …
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Anthroponymy
The first name appeared in my coffee. Every Tuesday, I met Albie at the coffee shop a block from his apartment. I placed my standard order. As always, Albie mocked me for not taking my coffee black. When my latte came, I didn’t immediately notice something was wrong. …
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I return to Brooks in the last third of my life
Hiding from politics of the present, the LP crackles and spins. Bronzeville still resonates, comes alive, still cuts deep. I wish I had the courage to try to be in conversation with this woman who meant so much to me. Now, I can only respond to her …
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Melogold Grapefruit
Winner of the 2025 Maine Postmark Poetry Contest, held in conjunction with the Belfast Poetry Festival. Stacked & freakishly stunning, each orb, every flashing peel glossy, mooning yellow hazards beckoning amber & oblate. The most beautiful fruit, a dimpled curiosity, wholly new in my winter-chapped hand. I, too, felt …
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The Ash Father
The first time I saw my father putting down roots, I thought it was just another of his eccentricities. He’d been acting strangely for years—forgetting names, hiding crumpled bills in coat pockets, staring off into the horizon with his mouth slightly open. He had always been honest, generous …
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Threnody for Words
Language falling from my head, my name, address to my childhood home, and every synonym for “stop” the first to leave me. Easy as fists of hair that come away in my hands. Easy as, after three years of refusing to look my mother in the eye, I forget …
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Sex Drive Homestead
Sometimes you want a sandwich and I don’t, so go make yourself a sandwich without me. It’s fine. It doesn’t have to say anything about our relationship or our desire to be known or why you think you’re turning into your father or who will win in November or …
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