He dies 10.30 their time, 4.30 mine. My cousin calls first with a repeated “I’m so sorry,” the word sorrysorrysorrysorry the only sense she can give me. Herself. As I listen, a freight train blows its mournful horn down in the valley. A bit of blues poetry to soften the onrushing facts: There are few […]
Prose
Jenny Rossi: Burnt Heart
Scraping toast. His voice is the sound of someone scraping toast. Little bits of emotion crumbling all over the floor, and you should be cleaning it up, but GODDAMN the sound is killing you! His eyes are two round eggs, cracked and leaking. Suddenly you realize you’re hungry, and lift up a knife (a knife! […]
Brenda Nicholas: Bratz Dolls Ask Brunette, Roxxi Bratz, to Write Response Letter to Critics Who Say the Dolls “Encourage girls to think about themselves as sexualized objects.”
Dear Sirz: We don’t agree with your criticizms of us at all! We are given clothez appropriate for our favorite placez & pastimez, such az shopz, nail salonz, clubz, bandz, datez & moviez. Short dressez are the fashion! And at least we wear pantiez—unlike Barbie. Sure, it is more uncomfortable and embarrassing to loze a […]
Matt Izzi: Volare
The American wing had high white walls like an asylum, and my best friend Mark said anyone who’d voluntarily stare at paintings had to be a nut job, drawing a threatening look from Mr. Bradford—as threatening as you could expect from a ceramics teacher—who was too busy corralling twenty-odd high school freshmen into the next […]
Jeff Friedman: Photo ID
When I knock on the door, Jenny doesn’t open it. “Who is it,” she asks. “It’s me,” I answer, “your lover,” impatient to get in. I’d only been gone a short time. “Do you have proof, a photo ID?” She opens the door with the chain still latched, and I hold up my driver’s license, […]
Fred Siegel: In the Moment
Shortly after graduate school, I join the Philadelphia company of Grandma Sylvia’s Funeral. This is an interactive play in which audience members arrive at “The Helsenrott Jewish Mortuary” and mingle with actors who portray the family of the deceased. After the coffin arrives sticking out the trunk of a car, the service begins and whacky […]