“What the—?” Sky’s hand stalled inside the bag, fingers grazing the lining like it might bite.  The leather was a tired brown, the kind that had once been pretty in store lighting and then surrendered to real life—edges blunted, corners...

Red, orange and brownYour lunch, your dinnerYou don’t have a choiceFor it’s your only fare now It’s now on sale in storesBuy now; it’s buy one, take oneRight now, it fits with riceAnd with salt plus soy sauce, too! Eat it...

Mamay, here you are soaking the soft riceAnd wrapping them in the leaves tender, darkenedDarkened by the tiniest flame that you whispered to.The bundles are dreams of shapes on top of each other.Listen, the water is graying and catching...

Armed with a rifle and overflowing with a warrior’s confidence, my classmate's brother marched into the woods, excited about his unforgettable first solo hunt. After all, they say you never forget your first. Deep in the forest, alone and...

Not the red ball of yarn I threw at her,a lizard’s tail,the bright threads of a woolen rag,a fish head, some greens that felloff the kitchen table,a piece of cracked shell,maybe an egg,perhaps a stray spider.  Resource and inventionwould lead...

Lander left our community church on the first Sunday of the year. Three years ago, I did the same thing. After college, I wanted to work in the city and felt the smallness of our community. That time, Lander...

When all is done, Mama shows mehow to knot the final stitch, carefulnot to tug too tightly at the thread.The doctor must have performedthe same art on my birthing mother. Replace the surgical lightwith afternoon sun and the ob-gynremembers how...

End with everything. Keep nothing. Then own it all again.Find a bad man on a good day. Lose a worse man,then reclaim five friends fleeing him. Forsake to lose as ifyour death discounted it, that your death depends on...

There is an old Japanese film called Okuribito, which Marvin once told him about in a hospital room as if recommending a comedy. In the film, a man cannot find respectable work and so falls into a profession no...

“Look!” she exclaimed. I followed her clue toward the glinting blue, and I saw a flock of birds on an expedition. As if on cue, they fly togetherthrough miles and miles of sky, throughout their long route above paths...

The church stood alone and abandoned at the edge of the town, an old structure built with weathered stone walls darkened by years of sun, rain, and neglect with tall wooden doors that creaked when pushed open. Its stained-glass...

They came before the day began,before I was ready to be seen.Pink lilies, shyly unfoldingagainst the raindrops of morning.Too early,and yet, how touching,that someone remembered,and could not wait.A student once,her handwriting still a little unsure,has sent these blooms ahead...