My mind wants to hinge on the negative. So I throw it the flip side & watch it simmer. And I throw it poetry & find a black hole. Shimmer back to senior year, how I tossed a swimming pool into the black hole paper, how creativity tossed with science is good enough to get […]
Washing the Dishes
When I finally insist that the vacuuming of the room needs to happen, the breaker clicks off. The roar of the machine overloaded the circuit. The room is black, only the light of the screen still lit. I push every breaker except for the right one, my rain boots on my feet grounding me to […]
Dec. 26th
Make a container of love strong enough to soothe: salty sweet shoreline.
Light
The day is slow enough that I notice the moment when a string of Christmas tree lights burns out. There’s no noise, just a light shift change to the right of me. I think it but don’t know it until a bit later. I want to capture the slow-down of today. The hyphen of every […]
Expectation
This day is laden with expectation. Even for this blog: how can I get it just right, pleasing every reader? It’s too much to manage, so I don’t. I step aside and let this suffice. The garbage truck is on our street. My husband and I woke early, and he remembered then to put our […]
Wintergreen
Wintergreen, mint-green, light-green a hatchling drawn & cut from textured fabric the rhythm of its making sounds like the dark rain needle & motor hammering dark rain meeting rooftop while her seam stitches wintergreen, mint-green, light-green darts in a circle loose around her waist a party of a dress perfect for California worn in Seattle […]
The Moon
The Moon by Nancy Schatz Alton I want to show you the moon on the way to the ice-skating rink— a day-away from full my daughter (next to me) laughing at my funny additions to the song the clouds adorning the sky the moon—a feast for our eyes a cliché—the easiest way to say it. […]
December 21
December 21 By Nancy Schatz Alton The whole world is you/ Yet you keep thinking/ there is something else.-Hsueh-Feng Or that I should be someone else. But I am very much yourself— unloading the dishwasher as the next right thing then feeling how good it feels to be doing. Where are your hands? I’m […]
Loss
Incomprehensible News by Nancy Schatz Alton I hear the news from you & I’m broken open even as I’m the one who’s supposed to hold you sometimes we hold each other. I make tea & the dog sits with us we are us on the couch not […]
Tears
The bubbles in the seltzer water rise to the surface. I watch them rise & think about your tears. The way they rise & greet the orthodontist. She’s flustered by the water that leaks out of you again & again & again. How stress causes the salt to pour out of your body, slip onto […]