My distaste for myself turned slowly to self-hatredas the rich and powerfulkept shitting on me.Poor me Every time I stopped at a gas pump or a supermarketand looked at the jacked-up prices as I filled my cartor the tank of … Continue reading
The core of the self is a magnetwhich pulls in the physical worldand the stuff of human nature,good and bad.Once trauma is caught there, it is hard to dislodge,the power of the magnet being strong In this space occupied by … Continue reading
Here I am,on the deck of a ship. It’s 1933,and the passengers who surround me are waving, frantically.I’m afraid that their arms will fall off and I will be calledto provide emergency services.I’m a doctor. At least I harbour the … Continue reading
Like the Dinosaurs Evening came, and never passed throughIt clung to the valley like smokeThe heat settled in and no earthly wind blewA layer of clouds swiftly broke. People looked strange in the dim purple lightTheir pallor and features were … Continue reading
Sunny Sunny thought that he was the Birdmanof Alcatrazbut it was only five months in the county slammer The day that his girlfriend, Miss Sunshine, came to retrieve himfrom his dank cellwas dark and gloomybut their two children, the girl, … Continue reading
After my father abandoned herMother moved back to the countryto live with her sisterin the house in which they grew up My aunt was feebleas she’d been in childhoodbut my mother was strongfrom all the farm labour she’d doneand still … Continue reading
She finally moved from Fukushimafled its failed, toxic nuclear plantI wasn’t close to her,don’t want to be close to her I get nervous when she moves toward me, arms widewith a smile unnaturally brightlike the ladies who painted radium on … Continue reading
I asked Princess Di to danceShe was biking across the heathin a glum mood wearing an expressionthat might have suitedThomas Hardy In fact, she would have taken up my offerShe would have danced with meWho knows what else she might … Continue reading
If they were going to put me in the nuthouse I was going to need my collection of Bertita Harding novels They had power– the stories of these heroes would keep me alive: Karl and Zita of Hungary Austria’s Franz … Continue reading
I grabbed a can of wasp spray from my wife’s hand She was a farm girl and stronger than me She grabbed the can back and hit me in the head with it Wasps had colonized the attic of our … Continue reading