OCCUPANTThe sad mailbox of my extreme youth, what did it ever deliver? The only...
A CRITICPick up your socks. Clean the house once in a while. Go to the dentist. ...
HISTORIANPiles and piles of books, boxes of documents, photographs, bones, shreds of clothes...
YOU WHO KNOWI was just enough bigger that I could wrestle you into the clean straw of the mow...
GRIFFY LAKEI spread my smooth water like a lap and caught the trees' faces where they fell...
9/27
She liked TV, it was everything to
her. The big chair with its
back to the window was the best to
sit in. A little table with
snacks and magazines and a tall
lamp right next to the chair. She
had twins. They would sit off
to the side and watch too.
Just three, they liked to push
little plastic toys back and forth
on the floor while they watched.
Sometimes they would look at each
other. It seemed to her that at
certain times of the day they were
in other rooms. Every so often
she'd hear a shuffling or
scraping noise through the wall.
Sometimes she couldn't tell them
apart. This frightened her. She
would sit and look at them
and they would stare back, just
looking, not curious, exactly
the same, no difference. If
someone came by, she would pre-
tend to tell the twins apart.
I don't know how you do it, the
friendly visitor would say.
Sometimes, after she'd been
watching TV for awhile, she
would turn her head and see them
looking at the screen. She
would watch them, fascinated,
for a time she couldn't judge.