Morning Rain for Kelly Sturner This morning there was much rain, forcing the birds into trees, the butterflies beneath leaves. I stand at the open window, listening for the cool...

    Longest Night It is still dark outside. Still but for water pouring, cascading down the steep, wooded slope. No rain now, nor wind. The world turns and breathes gently, mildly. I would...

    August, Departing Here’s the stain, heaved out and an orchard of clouds sleeping. The crows flee warm fugitives on August’s blunt edge. I see a distant coldness, the skirt of the sun...

    Cesare Borgia in Heaven He nods to his father, the pope, sets a velvet cushion atop a giant rose petal, and sits to savor the warm light of God. A monk in brown cassock stares. “Mind...

    Stitch I thread the needle with cotton fine and purple as the lavender growing in tufts outside of our living room window. I’ve taught myself to sew in this extra time, these hours of...

  Eve and Artemisia There was absolutely no doubt about it, everyone at the galleryhad said it one time or another.    "As an artist she has balls!"Yes, penis envy and the talent to do...

    the plunge wild flowers, earth bound ever moribund rooted to cracks in the cliff face. there they watch, blind witnesses, under starlit sky, as the girl yokes her ankle, ties the...

    Breadcrumbs My mother died on Tuesday. I am in her house. Steve, my husband, is in her kitchen making tea. I can hear the bubbling of the kettle, and warm steam seeps into the hallway...

    Eduardo’s In a restaurant made from the thin arms of a tree embracing white-washed walls, I eat strips of duck and strands of almond prepared by a stooped Belgian gentleman. A wall of...