words from the soul
A good memoir starts at the beginning. This one starts at the end. I guess that's your warning. Get out now while you can, while the story is bright and hopeful and you see me walking off into the sunset. It's only going to get darker from here. It is a few days before my … Continue reading The Last Chapter
The dead haunt my photo albums. There he is when his liver was not yet punishing him for drowning it in poison. The spark in her eye is still unclouded by deadly judgment. He poses with the suppressed cry for help just behind his upturned lips. I am floating around somewhere past them, come to … Continue reading Captured Memories of the Dead and Buried
It's the old house feeling, the one where I enter a space I have repainted in my memory, and the souring of nostalgia wells in my throat as the colors assault me with their mismatched hypocrisy.
Where are the walls I remember? Where are the trails of my wandering feet? Where is the smell of familiar? Where is evidence I come from here? Who tampered with this scene, dotting corners with fingerprints that do not belong to me?
Her hand is in mine; clammy because it is hot on these streets that smell of burgers, oil, and urine. She tries to lace her fingers with mine. I pull away slightly, aware of the implications. “My mother didn’t like holding my hand,” she tells the therapist casually. “Sweaty palms triggered her.” She is old … Continue reading Time, Untethered
“Ok, ok,” she said in what I think might have been an annoyed kind of tone. “I’ll show you how. Come downstairs later and you can watch me. But I don’t know amounts…just watch…just watch.” Later, I watched. Her tiny hands, even smaller because of the arthritis that kept her fingers curling in, worked at … Continue reading A Poppy Seed Cookie
Colloquially Speaking 