Frank Lehner: Mrs. Nussbaum’s Monkey
Pops never said much, but there he was in his T-shirt and loose boxers telling Jessers about the Easter Tuesday night he lost his mother and taking the streetcar to go to work because there was nothing to do until the next day, and the plant owner only gave two days off for deaths.
Barbara Hamby: Ode to Hardware Stores
Where have all the hardware stores gone—dusty, sixty-watt
warrens with wood floors, cracked linoleum,
poured concrete painted blood red?
Tony Hoagland: Sweet Ruin
Maybe that is what he was after,
my father, when he arranged, ten years ago,
to be discovered in a mobile home
with a woman named Roxanne, an attractive,
recently divorced masseuse.
Jessica Kutz: The Gender Gap on Climate
A new report shows a growing gender gap among people who vote with environmental issues in mind.
Thomas McGuire: Rust
Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. —Matthew 6:19-21 . Rust ruins metal everywhere. Dad, you would’ve fought … Continue reading
Laure-Anne Bosselaar: “Breakfast Morning” by Jacques Prévert
He made smoke
Circles in the air
He put the ashes
Into the ashtray
Without speaking to me
Without looking at me
Tony Gloeggler: Down by an Old Mill Where a Big Part of Your Heart Lives
…you and Jesse
have a gift. You can both stop time.
He’s autistic and you love the kid,
who’s now a man.
Matthew Carey Salyer: Carrier
Catholicschoolboys
fret as I once did like dappled stones
in their own fists. Scuffed wingtips. My ilk.
Tony Gloeggler: Blessings
The moral of these stories is that all blessings are mixed —From John Updike’s TOO FAR TO GO These days we make appointments to play slow motion basketball in Long … Continue reading
James Wright: A Note Left in Jimmy Leonard’s Shack
Near the dry river’s water-mark we found
Your brother Minnegan,
Flopped like a fish against the muddy ground.
Liza Katz Duncan: The Uncles
I’m forgetting others, I know.
One had a scar near his eye in the shape of a bird.
One, a firefighter, had tattooed the word
mercy, and fed the feral cats.
Stephen Haven: Iowa City, 1983
I remember best the cartography of each failed kindness…
Anna Manchin: How Men’s Bodies Change When They Become Fathers
In essence, being a dad is as biological a phenomenon as being a mom.
Doug Anderson: Tucson, 1954
One night when I was eleven, when my mother swung to hit me I reached up and grabbed her hand and was surprised at my own strength. We both knew … Continue reading
