During those bookish Midwestern college years of buzz-cut, leather jacket, and youthful butch bravado she enthusiastically relents to the errant interpretation of her gender — as classmates and professors alike assume her masculine appearance is evidence of actual manliness. This …
46
AN ANNOTATED HISTORY OF “DORIS”
God creates the world. He asks Adam to name the living creatures, since all kine and fowl of the air and beasts of the field should be endowed with their true names. – Genesis
1973
Birmingham, Alabama. Minnan “Charles” Cheng
The Rainy Season
raises up animals from their water houses:
birds like wet laundry, alligators close enough to appear
long-lashed and serene, Florida chicken turtle
bundled in the apartment parking lot
as though delivered by drone.
i’m just a black goddess & ryne/river/god
i’m just a black goddess
I can fantasize
about a married man
holding me, breathing in
the scent of a new, shared morning
that suffocates the fragmented
perfume from last night still
asleep on my neck,
and the soft of …
[IT IS JUST BEFORE THE WAR CRACKS THE LAND OPEN LIKE AN EGG]
—For Feiga Maler, 1919-1942, who died in the Kraków Ghetto
It is just before the war cracks the land open like an egg.
Her mother’s voice—rooted in the naked grief …
Dad’s Bathrobe
for summer blue and white seersucker
my sister froze when she saw me in it
I took it when he died and I’ve washed it
because of how he liked to beat us
a thousand times it’s ankle-length …
Are You Single?
for Michael Donald and his family
Released and returned, the hostages invaded
each and every news segment. The new president,
a former actor (Damon told her. Denise had never
heard of The Killers or Law and Order.) …
Older Boys
I’m going off again with older boys
who slouch in memorable shoes and coats
into the thickening forest or cars,
depending on their age, their chosen toy.
It never changes. Like a paper boat
gone floating off again with older …
012015
Where did I pick up a raw
right hand wrung more by New
England dew points than the brittle
prairie I abandoned it was pitted
with the graves of these same
small follicles they burrow deep
so I can’t pinch …
Art Is Not Therapy
Agent Bobby Chacon of the FBI Dive Team looks into the hole
his team has cut in the ice of Matanuska Lake, outside Anchorage,
and the first thing he sees is the face of eighteeen-year-old
Samantha Koenig, her eyes wide …
