“Like death, the violence was just where the thing ended,” Grandma said. “Your grandpa loved the training, the starving, the heat, the cold, the purpose. I know his least favorite part was the violence.”… more
“Like death, the violence was just where the thing ended,” Grandma said. “Your grandpa loved the training, the starving, the heat, the cold, the purpose. I know his least favorite part was the violence.”… more
Stripe-tailed with downy head plumage, amphibian up to ankles—truncated by Reorganized Latter Day Saint knicker flannel, she claw-writes ambidextrous each time the thunder comes. They published her without knowledge—just the way she prefers.… more
His eyes blinked like a machine gun’s stutter. He swirled his Chivas and mumbled something—I couldn’t hear it well over the racket of wild fucking in the bedroom. Maybe he said, “Mother would never have written that.”… more
I worried she had fallen asleep, then wondered why exactly our relationship had never been sexual, why I had started to think of everyone in these terms.… more
Darrell stared at the room placard just below the peephole until his sight went out of focus. He made the numbers 404 transform, they shuffled and stretched, elastic, until they spelled out their true meaning as Darrell saw them. A warning: Death O’Death.… more
Boxelder bugs swarmed the cinder block wall at our back while we waited for our ride. A few fluttered, struggling to stay aloft in the thick air, their orange-red wing veins flashing. I cupped my hands, gently caught one. … more
The women had left us when the heatwave began. At dusk, they had buried their heartjars in the earth and walked away. A line of women, mothers and wives, drifted through the valley. … more