Each evening after settling in bed, I glance at Zweig’s book and am reminded of my beloved grandmother. I reflect upon her difficult beginnings being orphaned at the age of eleven, and her subsequent immigrations. I think about how I credit her with my passions for writing and reading, after all, it was on her typewriter, where at the age of six, my first story emerged.
There was laughter in her left ear, and she turned out of curiosity, out of the deep need that draws human beings to want to join into laughter. A vibrant yellow car drove by, a car Jennifer recognized as a “Woody”. It wasn’t one, but it looked like one, she had thought years later.
Decades and brief visits pass as yearbooks.
In a drawer under sweaters, the pieces are all there
Repaired and stored, the taped seams curl ochre.
I pry the eyesore of a bird feeder off the deck, unblocking the impressive view of Lake Mendota. It’s a relief until I notice the sparrows swooping in for a feed, then veering off in confusion, realizing the feeder is gone. I feel like a traitor to his memory.
He was right about the summer being a scorcher, though. I hung out near the fan in the living room most of the time, ooohing and aaaahing to hear my voice vibrate off its spinning blades. Whenever the fan stopped suddenly, I knew Bobby had pulled the plug again and was about to list chores I suddenly needed to do.
let it echo against tender flesh
let the ink sink into tissue see:
my brain tattoos
itself on itself
The tattoo artist’s frown turned into a smile, “Oh, Azucena, she’s in the back. Just between you and I, she’s had some anxiety,” the tattoo artist said.
Dolores ran to the back of the shop. Azucena sat alone, surrounded by three walls filled with tattoo designs. Her bouffant grey hair, large glasses, and conservative dress, resembled more of a church lady than tattooed punker. Dolores smiled nervously.
Yanking on the fleshy membrane again, Madeline watches it tear further. She feels it pulling back, trying to close itself up, and grunts with effort as she forces her arm through, all the way the shoulder. Prying with the other hand, she manages to squeeze both arms into the hole. Next comes her head.
Part of the reason why the finale works so well is because we see the characters escape patterns of self destruction that had been eloquently described decades before its airing. Firstly, through the Freudian concept of death drive, the Fishers appear to want to find their own finalities within what they learn.
The blood releases easily from the grooves of the seventy-year-old maple floors. Polly pauses at the memory of her grandmother, scouring those same floors in a lace bonnet that kept her blue foam rollers in position.
Do you want to munch popcorn? He asks
I decline
The movie plays in balletic motions
There’s a man on screen who eats too many
words and swords.
I went to the funeral home for the service the following week. They cremated Larry Gagliardi. From the paraphernalia that was around, it looked like the family was Roman Catholic. He had a large family, many family members who shared the heavy-browed, almost Cro-Magnon facial features of the man I’d seen in the photograph online, and a woman who stood out, who didn’t look like the rest. I assumed she was his wife.
With those safety measures enacted, he created a profile on the now-defunct gay dating site Connexion and selected an intense, frowny photo of himself seated backwards in a chair in a very Cool Youth Pastor pose. ‘Sup? My name’s Eli. Let me rap at ya, he seemed to say.
Nobody comes down this road anymore. We hardly sell any gas. There are Twinkies on the rack older than me, and the Coca Colas are so old I think they probably have actual coca in them. The zoo is the only thing that ever brings anybody in.
He looked at me thoughtfully, drumming his long, slender fingers on the counter. The sound was hypnotic, calming, and I began to feel drowsy. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wondered what had happened to the other customers. But the faint tapping continued, and suddenly, I was back in my grandfather’s hundred-year-old farm house, hearing the click of heels on an oak floor.
Yes, Szabina thought, biting her lip and smiling. He was becoming one of her favorites. Perhaps she would sleep with him after all. Closing her eyes, she began to conjugate Italian verbs aloud, preparing for their meeting in an hour with the informant they had come all this way to meet. To challenge herself, she added in the same verbs in English, the grab-bag language always giving her trouble.