The Drawer Marked Meats
A bedtime story about Bluebeard all the wives on meat hooks then wake up and the house is dark. Fear is a gift from mother— the way she grabbed our collar bones, said: get inside. We had the … Continued
Author Archives: Lisa Allen Ortiz
Filling Station
On my way up north I stop to fill the Honda up. I like to time the emptiness so I can fill it at my favorite place: a Chevron with a taqueria in the minimart where the Honda … Continued
Algorithm
The Boardwalk lit up in constellations of tilt-o-whirls and loop-o-planes, and I can’t find a word to express loneliness that brilliant and hard-won. I have a stillness in me that’s yellow-paged and bramble-lashed. I think the word I … Continued
Novoandina
My children stopped eating when we moved to this country. Their sandwiches come home untouched in their sacks, whole apples, whole crackers, un-nibbled pieces of cheese. Breakfast, they refuse fruit, toast, yogurt. They sip dew-beads of water from … Continued
Song Bird & Beef Bone ||| Duende
Bird perches in the strings of flesh and sings of the dead. What we all do. Same day I heard the story about the boy. Same day the weather changed, dark clouds all along the ridge. Where they found the … Continued