November Skye Cut the bracken for bedding. If the frost comes first it crumbles, but the cattle still have rushes. These are the best days, work, not of necessity. I have the...

      Bookish   1 – Reading Rooms, Bodleian Library   She trails her finger down the paper slips that fill the ancient catalogues until she finds the books she wants, then softly...

      A  Fist Full of Bees (for Bob) The bumble bees were  furry like your favourite cat You caught them one by one stroked  them gently and held them in your tiny fist. Their...

      Affection Why do I feel guilt when you say I want to get close, but my back hurts? Yesterday on our walk I saw a fox turn his tail toward me, the leaves parting for his body. I...

      She Was Sweeter Than Rain In her sleep, the next morning seemed ridiculous. Inside the effect was . . . psychological.  The stress of a first time in unbreathing skin revolted...

    Big Lies Aplenty Language is a tricky business, full of shading and nuance, Power and play. I say one thing, they hear another. I say this But mean that. I’ve lied some, told the truth...

    [Don’t think I didn’t think it] Don’t think I didn’t think it running down streetlamp-lit streets, skinny jeans, razorburn between my ribs and the phone between my fingers, digital...

    A Desirable Location the dead dug themselves up from the graveyard moved their housing over the nearby hill so they’d have a view out beyond the cliff to where sea winds lift waves...

    Autopsy Below the towering one hundred foot canopy of river oaks and an understory of dogwoods is the brown skeleton of a dead hydrangea. There is no doubt of its morbidity since...

    The Letters I Can you hear the leaves as they fall as they hit the ground with a thump the stomach, teeth, legs, and heads falling from the branches of language that can no longer hold...