she wonders if I would love her were she ugly; ravished in a fire/gored by wild hounds/broken in half to protect me, I find myself unable...

The internet says smelling citrus means someone you love is near. Maybe they’re in the kitchen stripping a lemon of its zest. They could...

On the second and final date, I help you fold your laundry. You ask me if I’ve ever worked retail, because I’m impressively good at this,...

every woman wants to own a bookstore café by the beach emergency exit the market saturation of a dream in which everything is everything...

My mother stands by the counter of her kitchen pointing to her belly. I am visiting her for three weeks and am prepared to clock in as...

Sitting under an umbrella to reduce the glare, I’m trying to read on the beach. But I keep getting distracted by my cellulite; it’s more...

We used to walk along the beach at sunset, our hands sticky from selling overpriced lemonade and our cheeks burnt from applying small...

A long languid breakfast pancakes with sausages blueberries dripping in honey-rich syrup oh, I surely deserve it — luscious black coffee...

She carried her mother's pain as a dolly stroking its face, whispering hush in its ear. She unclipped her purse and emptied handfuls of...

As a shell-shocked shell-shaped whorl of a girl, I rock forward into your arms like falling off something, a logor a jigger filled with...

In most of my memories, he’s two-dimensional. Pressed flat. Like a character, or hologram, or specter. A smudge of mood and anger. As...

I roll your indecency on my tongue. Like a wad of gum. Something to chew on, And then spit out. But the aftertaste, Fresh and stinging as...