BLUEPEPPER

I’ve spoken English my whole life and now I’m learning Death. It’s a difficult language with only one pronoun, first-person singular. When y...

Goldfinch A break in the traffic pushed me away from the cigarette butts, plastic bags, sneakers, things lost their fight at the bus stop to...

Chasing Loki We just sat down but John jumps up from the table where salad waits untouched as he heard the front door squeak realizes the do...

One day when you die you live again is the story at church and Sunday School so you never really die though you do but you live again and fo...

Embers The lights are changing   green to red, the sun   is clean upon the ground;  the passengers wait  with empty thoughts  for the day to...

Despite What You Might Think There are still drunks today, in 2023, after all the Naltrexone and bad bets, after bad TV and drummer’s livers...

Lost in the Woods  The path’s dark dirt cushioned my soles in shoes. I walked up and out of woods to the street of Cape Cod homes, an unmark...

Courtship   She handed him his heart after she found it amid the rubble on trash day. He gave her eyes, a pair she lost long ago on the beac...

  The Shadow Cast By Gentleness In the patter of city street puddles, I see the truth about chaos.  In the center of everything,  there is a...

Wanderlust * Oikophobia; the fear of one’s home. Plain walls are closing in, nowhere to run. Eleutheromania; an intense desire for freedom. ...

Lover  You always believe. That yours Is the best A trust that will Last;  the torturous  weaves; of late night conversations  with its airs...

The War  Maybe we  Can win the war:  We have piles  Of glorious guns and  Hundreds of  Soldiers to  Shoot them.  They will happily  Fight fo...

Both Praying He brings carnations to the feet of the Mother, red and two days old from the corner store. Lays them delicately before her sto...

Fair Game Last spring they dug up the bittersweet, wild ivy and grape vines. Of course I didn't actually own them. It was just an advent...

The Souls We Stand On If I had enough chalk. I’d give my mom wings but I was unsure if I could hold her hand and draw without breaking the l...

Burning Down* Close up on withering sunflower  Pull out to reveal a head stone  Her black eyeliner as clean and dark as twenty years ago  An...

Absence How many went missing? Most.  One way or another. We have talked  of that time but who wants to try and  imagine the reality? It liv...

Scam Avenue   Imagine going for a walk and encountering all the scammers who send you bogus email every day. Instead of reading about   your...

Death Call I missed it but my officemate said that was what the caller had said to give the call a name Not many people whose death would pr...

Praise the Insects Let me praise the dark red bird, nameless, obsessed praise the twilight and the off-hand evening light borrowed and tired...