The Grammar of Staying
Midwinter, 1980–81 The cold had a grammar then. It conjugated the body into ache and wait, into not-yet. Doorways learned my outline. Cardboard kept the minutes from breaking apart.
Winter, After You
On the Season You Became a Stranger Grief is not a state but a landscape; you wake in it one morning and realize it has changed its shape while you slept. - C.S. Lewis Snow settles on the silent lawns, a hush drawn tight across the town; I walk the path we traced together before you left - and took them down.
The Night My Courage Clocked Out
A Memoir of Fear in Someone Else’s Living Room November 24, 1979 Sweetest singing I ever heard. And a feeling like drowning. And eyes...eyes! - Mike Ryerson, Salem's Lot
First Kings of Elmira - 1975
In the summer of 1975, the grass along Eldridge Park field ‘neath the old wooden roller coaster was patchy, tall in places, thin in others - but to us, it was emerald, endless, a kingdom under the slow, benevolent sun.
The Wolfman on Lincoln Street
I was eleven, and the house was so quiet it felt like it had stopped breathing. Downstairs, my family was watching some dumb show - Dad in his easy chair, Skipper curled on his lap, my mother probably knitting, my brother and sister laughing at canned jokes from the set.
The Brass Ring
A remembrance at Eldridge Park in Elmira, NY At the edge of the hills, where the air holds the scent of mown grass and river wind, a diamond-shaped field gathers the last of the sun. Dad laces his cleats,
Inheritance, Poured Neat
People are trapped in history, and history is trapped in them. - James Baldwin Evening eased itself into the pub the way habit does - unannounced, welcome.
The Woolworth’s Combo
I rode the bus that smelled like rain And vinyl seats and yesterday, With coins that clinked like nervous dreams All counting up my hourly pay.
