To be a man. to be two men, together. To feel absences filled— hard pressure, thrusting pain— to take pleasure without fear of fullness, without fear of my womb, without the threat of a body bloated with life. To never lie in bed, facedown, hand clutched against my stomach feeling the ache of a violated cervix, the angry uterine clench that follows satisfaction. To be…
Blackbird
Over the furrows of the northern field— a coded flash of blackbird wings. Memory bursts from the hedgerows: a pair of girls in skirts and knee socks and weed-flowered hair, a fawn decomposing in the ditch, wired to a slab of plywood, tattered pelt on thin bones. How to make sense of those rusted nails thrust into gangling newborn limbs to keep her in place?…
The Camera
An excerpt… Twenty odd years before and that truck was there for best friend. Pete. When I say I truly loved him, it means just that. I truly loved him. We was like brothers without the blood. Used to set up all night writing and singing songs and dreaming about being the next rock and roll Beethoven’s. That night so far away but I can…
Quiet
A few months ago, near the end of the summer, we stood chatting over the fence, far in the back by the old shed with the paint peeling from the door, a hoe in your hand, trowel in mine. You talked about your only brother, I, my only daughter. Your brother talked constantly you said. I said my daughter couldn’t talk at all. You said…
Echocardiography
I lifted my three-year-old daughter, Willa onto my shoulders, and then we continued up the hill to take in the view of the Georgia pines and perhaps spot a deer, or the great-horned owl that had swooped skyward there a few days before. I was enthused by the leisurely morning, but soon my chest tightened, my heart beating far too fast. Something’s wrong, I said…