So I had really planned to have a good dozen links to a good dozen poems and stories for this post, but then, life happened. I’m flexible, though, and decided to go with what I have because the two flash fictions, one video-poem, and one text poem here are dynamite.  You just can’t get any better than these. So, forthwith:

“Hands” by Tara Isabel Zambrano in The Sonder Review and Fictionaut.

“I stay up all night. I write. I give up cashews and pistachios. I spend my time looking at his things wishing they were gone too. My only sliver of comfort about his death: how everything is beyond damage and repair; how everything you value slips to vaguely important.”

That line about “everything is beyond damage and repair” is so fundamentally true – in a good way and in a despairing way. It made me think of loved ones who’ve passed and how I can no longer hurt or disappoint them but, also, how the old hurts can never  be repaired. The “I’m sorries” that were never said can never be said after death so say them now.

“Last Night on the Q Train” by Bud Smith on his blog.

“Out on the street there are children screaming and it goes perfect with her story. The fire burns the building down floor by floor and the children in Prospect Park on this dead end street scream and throw a basketball around at 10pm on a Sunday night.”

So I am in love with  everything New York right now because  I’m taking my first trip there in the spring. I am beyond excited. I’ve taken to reading NewYork.com and The Gothamist. I’m researching walking tours, Broadway shows, and the typical tourist attractions. But I’m also very interested in the off-the-beaten-path sights and scenes. I’m  currently reading Patti Smith’s memoir M Train and I’m making a list of all the coffee houses she mentions (although several so far have closed.) I’m absorbing all things NYC so if anyone has suggestions please share!

“Self-Portrait with Blue” by Robert Okaji from his chapbook The Circumference of Other included in The Silver Birch Press chapbook collection, IDES, just published on October 15.

The color of moonlight and bruises, of melancholy and unmet
expectation, it cools and calms, and slows the heart.

I love this meditation on green and blue, two of my favorite colors together. The colors of nature, calming and serene. This is what I refer to as a dreamy poem, one to be read while lounging in a hammock on a beautiful autumn day like today.

And, finally, a video of Bill Yarrow reading his poem, “Prompts”. This is SO good and it makes me chuckle. Sometimes poetry prompts get me out of a writing funk but sometimes I roll my eyes at the absurdity of them. Yin and Yang, I guess, as with life itself.

Have a great week-end, all. Get out and enjoy the beautifu fall weather. And, if it’s not beautiful where you are just immerse yourself in a good book. xo