Poetry

She hugs me from behind my face in the mist of a mirror While standing beside fertile pots of yellow daises and forget-me-nots, my neighbor Betsy and I boasted about…

Once a year, the woman swims across the Atlantic. The longing comes over her like a seasonal affliction, like ragweed allergies or the desire for Christmas lights. The woman does…

Our girls tutu in adjacent rooms Princess costumes varieties of ruffled pink The right size still won’t fit in their age of pre- (pre-school, pre-constraint pre-smooth, pre-obey) Charming tumblers earning…

Balding, with a holistic practice. He pulls his trousers over his mild paunch, my dentist. In the bathroom of the 19th century building he has meticulously rehabbed is a calligraphed…

He’s made his way into our bed again, one small elbow dangerously close to my eye. And though I barely fit the sliver of middle you two back sleepers leave…

may I trade a cow’s skull cracked, stained half the jaw gone for your dirty T-shirt? it reminds me of oil-rags and sons, bums up over the engine of an…

They say I have moods, that I am moody. Well, actually, I have only three moods — neutral, upset, and very upset. It’s they that have the moods, if that’s…

Forty-five I watch My teenaged daughter Run breathless Into our house. Refrigerator open, She stops. Turns to me Eyes wide, It’s true, she says My friends joke I look just…

I’m rocking to the rhythm of the rain with Noah on my lap, His head nodding with each to and fro, His eyelids drooping, lashes casting spiky shadows on his…

The stray ballpoint, a gun. Umbrella, a sword. Hands empty, the air gets a roundhouse kick. Is this typical “boy” I want to ask. Or just typical of this boy?…

I watch intently as the technician spreads ice-blue jelly over my daughter’s rounded stomach. For an instant, it seems as if we should trade places, and I should be lying…