Books, Short Stories, and Poetry
Child, when did it die, the light inside? A decision at some point in time? A bitter, free fall dive or mournful, listless slide? A whirlwind ride, or the long wave goodbye to the ebbing tide of potential energy stored once inside, where hope, now lost, did once reside? Was it pride? A call to... Continue Reading →
They’re women. Not a plank in your stage, just average everyday Janes; your neighbors, for Godssake, mothers and sisters. Some have, some consider with trembling and doubt — one way in, no way out. Some married, some teens, so many between a hard choice and a harder so they barter with God and the stars... Continue Reading →
Mid-July, mercury high, summer sky blue with a grey hue above the horizon line. The west wind will be blowin’ in a boomer come afternoon, but in the meantime she takes a set on the porch railing, listless eyes trailing, “The heat brings out the green in the leaves,” to nobody in particular she declares.... Continue Reading →
A seam is not a place, not a space, rather a void, like a borderline — not a destination but a fabrication of the imagination. Tear the pieces apart, slash every last stitch and the seam no longer exists — a momentary blip. Not a thing to hold, but to behold; and if I could... Continue Reading →
Look at that smile, been a while since it had last been seen. Had to hop off the wheel. So we swapped one coast for another — left the kids with your mother and bid a fond fair well to the Atlantic. Flew three thousand miles to walk ten more, a tour of the shore... Continue Reading →
Quilted stratus, high above my troubles, Roseate, heralding the breaking day. I in lonesome quilted blanket huddle, Sallow, darkness’s cover fades to gray. — Unburd’ning pines cast needle tines aside. Aimless zephyrs cut wild ‘cross the meadow. Laden I lay lamenting swelling tides, Fettered by sheets — by schemes wrought in shadows. — The thrush... Continue Reading →
Silhouettes in the pre-dawn, Held breath, the long pause, Facing the grey horizon — An intersection: Celestial rotations Fateful contemplations Primal sensations — Gathering like ritual. A spiritual Observance of time reborn. How yesterday mourns: By the heavens so fated. Once anticipated, Eradicated — The long pause, offerings raised. Cosmic gears unfazed. Starry firmament retreats.... Continue Reading →
Jack was hungover as he labored alongside Father, but was sobering up quickly by the sights and sounds of humdrum reality. The faint peal of church bells, like smelling salts, woke him fully to fresh ol’ hell. The distant mountains purple-gray, golden fields, every shade of green, all God’s majesty and yet the scene brought a pang of anxiety. The bells, those Sunday morning harbingers of desolation, singing hymns to Creation, and yet Jack saw only isolation in them hills. Those grim ranges a fence, hemmed him in, miles from significance. Scream as he might, though the stars could hear his howl, though the angels would scowl, though Zarathustra would weep just up the Road yonder, the hills echoed only the ding-dong bells of noon.
“Is this seat taken?” he asked, with trepidation. The woman across the table looked up from her book with a mixed expression of surprise and apprehension. The ambient sound of the café was a low, steady chorus of clanking spoons and steam nozzles and Saturday morning banter - all tell-tale signs of a coffee shop... Continue Reading →
Just outside Owego, New York where the interstate turns south, and the terrain of the Southern Tier pushes the horizon ever higher, an offshoot of the Susquehanna cuts into a shallow valley between oak-speckled hills. Through remote country does the creek wind, ever waning as it meanders northward, unnoticed by the infrequent passerby, save the... Continue Reading →