Essays

Essay |

“Banding”

“Someone posted today that ICE vans were out in force, hunting the valley for illegals …”

Essay |

“Thirteen”

“When I was your age the girl I loved dumped me the night a ball went through Buckner’s legs and the Sox would lose the Series and she kissed Dave.”

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“On The Level”

“When the grass ripens, Dad mows, rakes, bales, and wraps it alone, in rotations that last throughout the summer. Sometimes he manages to hire a cousin or neighbor, but help is hard to find in hay season.”

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“The Past Tense of the Census”

“There were heads to count, assessment questions, and not every house, she soon learned, was welcoming. House trailers were rare and always alone …”

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“Recognition”

“An asylum, one day, was identified from our car. My mother, tired of my ‘acting a fool,’ said, ‘A wing is reserved there for children’ …”

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“The Silence of the Wasps”

“The morning of my hospital appointment, I research the humours in medieval medicine – black bile, blood, phlegm and yellow bile. Yellow bile is choleric, inciting anger, irritability, envy and jealousy.”

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“Jabas”

“If you were really Cuban, you would have learned sooner to carry plastic bags, tucked in your purse, in pockets, down the front of your shirt.”

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“How The Sausage Is Made” and “Dispatch”

“He eats a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and watches a television show about vocabulary. His father calls to say goodnight and is mildly disgruntled that the child is watching television.”

Essay |

“The Gift of the God”

“… they come shopping for organic tomatoes because they heard organic might cure their cancer or black lung. They come lugging their oxygen-tanks along with them …”

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“Rated M For Mature”

“When I ask him if he thinks Grand Theft Auto could influence kids in negative ways, he says, ‘Maybe some kids. But Mom, I know it’s just a game.'”

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“The Small Psychoses”

“But that night before the robins. Coyotes and a struck sheen of moon. Others heard or you would have thought it was just your mind again.”

Essay |

“On Place”

“When we say place, we often mean space. A space for this life. Elbow room. A room of one’s own. Sometimes a transit space. Between habitats, natural or alien. Littoral zone. Comfort zone.”

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“Four Music Lessons”

“Without music for two years, thanks to the deafness that’s deepening on me, I’ve recently found that on good days, with the help of high-powered headphones, I can hear it again.”

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“Samwiches”

” … their little hands finger their unwanted food while they try to grow accustomed to the hunger they will carry for the rest of the day …”