Browsing: MER Online

Poem for the New Year My daughter said she would go outside her comfort zone, would pull the string on a booze-bottle popper. When her hands didn’t burn, she popped another. Said she’d try harder at school, listen in History.…

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Instructions for Motherhood Gut the herring. Cover your body in ash. Thorn with the blood that grows from the roses. Layer dirty linens with hot water and lye. Beat the caustic bleach that forms. Seed the ingredients for medicines and…

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Winter Baby Tell me the truth, I said to my friend, who had just given birth. How bad is it? You won’t believe the blood, she said, for which truth, I am indebted. And January, especially, is no time for…

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Sunflowers Just inside the gate, the rise and fall of dying sunflowers: disheveled petals and downcast eyes. Then a flick of wing and I realize a sparrow is locked in a kiss of life, face deep in the flower’s, seed…

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