family – honey gaze

Sanctuary

Agatha scrapes open the rusting backyard gate, and a chorus of yips erupts from the inside of the bungalow. The troops emerge from the homemade dog flap in the back door; thirteen chihuahuas, dachshunds, and small mutts veer through the maze of vinca tendrils and tiger lilies to reach her as she walks up the thin path.

“Goddamn slimy devil spawn that girl is!” Agatha’s wrathful smoker’s voice rasps through the open kitchen window. “The audacity to try something this shifty, I just can’t fathom it.”

Rooted

A yipping serenade of small dogs bursts/from my grandmother’s house when I open//the chain-link fence to the backyard, a version/of Eden that moved to the South and let itself//grow over.

Pride & Joy

I’m having a hard time feeling the same level of pride and euphoria I usually feel during the beloved month of June. This is my first Pride month as a married queer person and the feeling really is bittersweet. I think about my younger self, before I was out of the closet, never dreaming thatContinue reading “Pride & Joy”