Ma Valise

15 October 2019 in Writing

At the end of their relationship, she packed a small blue suitcase, scolded her cat for biting the handle, and left Los Angeles for the convent. In the crook of her arm, she carried his brain in a jar. Ball jar. Rubber ring seal. The pickled eternal he always wanted to be. Together they took up residence in a small room on the second floor above the cheese cave. Every day smelled like a new age of cheese. She place the jar on the corner of the desk where it could sunbathe from three to four each afternoon. After the sun passed, she pressed her ear against the glass, curious if he was still thinking. She swore she heard him
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Spell for Reclamation

10 September 2019 in Heather

Get in the car and bring him back from the bottom of the world. Knit a sweater, but not while driving. When you arrive, that’s the time for knitting– Real-time knitting, around and around his protesting form. Close the door before he attempts to head out for a hike. But, oh. You hold the yarn; you’ll know where to find him. On the trail where together you once saw rabbits, On the trail where together you witnessed the fog strangle the sunset, And you agreed, “Don’t tell anyone.” Keep knitting the collar, high, higher, up to his chin, over his mouth. Now he’ll never tell. Finish the knit and fold him neatly into the passenger seat. Then get in the
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Empty Things

1 September 2019 in Writing

She fills her house with empty things. Old birdcages found at Saturday yard sales. A wrought-wire townhome for someday finches, an expansive manse for two former lovebirds (they could not quench their thirst, though separate glasses had been provided). And a souvenir from Vietnam, in whose crisscrossed bamboo shoots, she riddles herself to sleep. She fills her house with empty things. Vintage perfume bottles arranged on a tray on her dresser. Frosted bodies in pink and blue, curvaceous “squeeze me” atomizers whose misshapen forms hardened long ago (she denies any likeness to her heart). And straight away, she dabs herself with one of the cut and polished stoppers smugly gossiping about how to withstand aging. She fills her house with
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Bodies on Stage

18 August 2019 in Theater, Writing

Superstition There is a skeleton me I rarely meet. She jangles and dangles through the farmer’s market and down the aisle to her seat at the opera, pieces becoming suddenly unhinged in the direction things are meant to come apart. There is the muscle and fat me that is always aware of her. My mimic, my delay. My repetition, my echo. Signpost This body is a signpost, like the one in my brother’s backyard pointing to all the places he and his family have visited. The foot slides forward, toward Tibet. The pinky finger escapes sideways, to that small bakery on the Rue des Martyrs in Paris. Palms flip up, returning to the San Francisco Bay Area. Shoulders twist, one
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The Pinecone

16 August 2019 in Heather, Writing

I. Grief knocks the pinecones from my limbs. I can’t pick them up, which makes me wonder if grief is really to blame, or did I deliberately let them loose to lose you, to claim good riddance and then bemoan: I can’t pick them up. More than four seasons pass. I was always a late bloomer. Yet, here they all are again. Fifteen, sixteen, so many months to remind me of you. I twist like a child in elementary school, attempting to whittle my waist. “Helicopters!” shouts the long ago gym teacher. My swaying does not dislodge you. It takes grief, sweeping through like a storm, to knock the pinecones from my limbs. II. I leapt. I left. And you
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Love Stories

10 August 2019 in Heather, Music, Theater

Let me tell you a story. A love story. It’s about sharing. Making room. (Move over.) It’s general admission. You don’t get to claim your seat. There’s never enough room. Yes, it’s a love story. You. Me. Your ego. My id. There was never going to be enough room. (Give a girl a seat!) I told you: This is a love story. It’s about sharing. ~Text for performance; Premiere August 2019 at The MilkBar in Richmond, CA.

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