April Afternoon

The spots of April blazeagainst Earth’s cracking.Tulips lit like matchesheld to cardstock clouds. Pigeons hover in droves,creating a crown in the air.Their wings become eyesthat blink at me. Windows line up in a rowas if emerging from the mason’scareful brickwork.Once I held something worth holding.

Everything You Do is a Balloon

Blue flare of sunlight on the floor after passing through a balloonI am obsessed with the helium-filled globes, the tug upwardson the ribbon tied around my wrist. I dream of being tiny,floating down the hall in a tiny paper basket. The candy shine makes my mouth water. I want to stick the balloon in my

Family Homestead in Eastern Arizona

We know how to cut ourselves off. After passing through Show Low, driving through stands of ponderosa pine, kicking up clouds of red dust, pointing at specks of Harris’s hawks hanging up in the thermals, mile marker 372, turning off highway 60 onto forest road 117, wheels crunching, songs like “Red Wing” winding through our

if/then

if i am beside myself, then there is no space on this benchif i hold my breath, then sparks flicker across my vision if a magpie lands on a lamp post, then it flicks its tail onceif it lands on a mailbox, twice if you are finished eating, then help me with the dishesif you

Artificial Sweetener

I remember the sugar cookies in middle school, butter softand sweet enough to curl your lips into a smile. They lefta little grease on your fingers that smelled better than anybirthday lotion. White linoleum tiles speckled with graylined the floor of the cafeteria while the ceiling felt too low,the room filled with heat and middle

When Wishing Still Worked

January:The water is full of metal, so fill your mouth with the taste of ironand remember this will protect you from the fairies. February:They feed you God and fairytales. They want you to be a princess: graceful,meek, and quiet. You want to be the wolf with a belly full of stonesas smooth as fresh bread.

The Robber Bridegroom’s Bride

We enter the woods against our will,bare trees scraping the sky until it bleeds.Our dress gets caught on briars of course.Although we’d like to just return home,we know stories never go that way.We are hoping for 7 short men perhaps, but know they’d never live in twisted woods like these. No, these are witch’s woods,

slow news day

dog on the fence post dog on the rundog on the television shooting a gundog in the dahlias dog at the delidog goes to canada dog shows its bellydog head empty and dog belly full dog chews rawhide till dog’s teeth dulldog in the canyon dog barks at birdsdog sopping wet with a mouthful of

Ode to the textbook

O tome filled with all the answers,sit squarely at the center of my desk.Bask in sunlight, precious text!Let it warm your sage pages.I lift you gently, feel your heft,angle you carefully, as if somehowyour words could pour outonto the ground and be lost.I see you and know that Iam in a phase of learning.I hear

1866

I think about it more than I’d like to admit:a young cowboy in America–dirty, scuffed,and taking care of the herd, riding acrossdry summer fields on a black quarter horse.To the west–to the west so far it’s East–an old samurai, one of many in the lastgeneration of an ancient order soonto be disbanded and stripped of