Tag: love (Page 3 of 6)

Target, at Christmas

17 December 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Allison Baldwin

All it takes is the laughter of children,
the screech of shopping carts
to remind me of love.

In the aisle on my left,
red shirts in straight lines
waiting to be purchased
one by one.

Several feet away,
my best friend, walking, in an opposite direction
toward Starbursts, Sweet-Tarts, Goobers.

I know her: a sugar queen,
even as she asks me not to let her be.

I know me: last minute shopper, buying gifts for family
even when the task is far from easy.

In a basket:
Two small notebooks
A Yoshi hat my brother will never wear
A pair of Mario socks he will.
Some dog toys.

Love is not always easy, either.
But it holds its weight.

At the register, my friend gives into temptation,
buys the candy anyway
yet I follow through, tell her not to.

(The secret: I’ve already bought her
the sweets she seeks)

When she wonders why,
I say, “I am just doing my job.”

We laugh,
and the clerk joins in.

Allison Baldwin is a poet who combines authenticity with sass. Her work has been published in print and online, with an essay forthcoming in Folkway Press’s Right to Life anthology. She holds an MFA in Poetry and Poetic Medicine from Dominican University of California.

How Poppi Met Nonni

17 December 2023 / Editor

Nonfiction by Tarah Friend Cantore

I place the delicate ornament into the small box, nestled in the green tissue paper. It is a pink ceramic baby shoe with Baby’s First Christmas on it.

I imagine it is the year 2033. My family is gathered for the holidays at our New Hampshire home.

My youngest granddaughter, Ella, giggles and says, “Poppi, tell us the story about how you and Nonni met!”

From the kitchen, I can see Vinnie sitting in his leather chair in the great room. Bode climbs onto his knee, exclaiming, “Yeah, Poppi!” Ella is occupying the other knee, grinning from ear to ear. The four-year-old inseparable cousins are curly-haired, brown-eyed bookends.

Hazel runs from the kitchen to join her brother and cousin. As the flour from her auburn hair releases, a cloud of white dust trails behind her. At only nine years old, she has entered the Children’s Baking Show, and this afternoon, she is schooling us in the kitchen, baking Linzer cookies with raspberry filling.

My daughters, Brittany and Molly, as well as Molly’s wife, Jordan, are with me in the kitchen. Jordan is sitting at the island, where Molly is standing next to her, caressing her pregnant belly. I bring my favorite blue-glazed mug to my lips, appreciating the warmth in my hands and my heart.

“Bake at 350 degrees!” I shout at my new oven. Apparently, it will sense the temperature of whatever is baking or cooking so as not to overcook or undercook. While I am confident it will be efficient and accurate, there’s something to be said about slightly undercooked, gooey cookies. Besides, perfect baking doesn’t exactly fit with my hope to give my grandchildren the gift of imperfection, something I never had.

Hazel’s younger sister, Lydia, momentarily pops her head up from reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone when Hazel enters the room, then she resumes reading. She is sitting in the “cubby” with her father, Bo. When our daughters were little, they referred to the “cubby” as the spot at the end of the couch where they would sit in the bend of someone’s legs. When our grandchildren come to visit, they fight for the spot, yelling, “I want the cubby.”

Lydia is seven years old and a real bookworm. She will likely complete the first Harry Potter book and bring The Chamber of Secrets home with her. She has wavy, auburn hair and resembles Hermione, one of the characters in her book.

Vinnie begins, “Well, first of all, I had a crush on your Nonni before we even met.”

Ella inquires in her soft little voice, “What is a crush?”

He tilts his head slightly towards Ella. “A crush is when you really like someone and believe you could even love them.”

Ella and Bode nod in sync.

Hazel looks at her father. “Dada, did you have a crush on Mama?”

Bo smiles and says, “I did!”

Without Lydia’s eyes leaving her book, she adds, “On the softball field.”

“That’s right! But that’s another story,” says Bo.

Hazel plops down on the rug in front of the fireplace and focuses on Vinnie.

He says, “I saw her that night at Minerva’s. The closer I got, the more pretty she was-“

Bode interrupts, “What’s Minerva’s?”

“It was a bar in Burlington where Nonni went to college.”

Lydia sits up from the cubby and exclaims, “You and Nonni met at a bar?”

“That’s right.”

He had all of the children’s attention now.

“I asked Nonni if she remembered me, and she did. We talked some. I was about to ask her to dance, but my friend, Mark, was bugging me to leave. I asked her if I came back, would she dance with me? She smiled shyly and said, ‘Yes!’ When I returned later, I found her, and we danced. But then she said she had to leave.”

I recalled the sticky bar floor, the 80s music, and his adorable face.

“When we walked out of the bar, I leaned over and tried to kiss her.”

Bode wrinkled up his face and said, “Gross, Poppi!”

Vinnie refrained from laughing. “Well, she didn’t let me anyway, Bode!”

I was no floozy.

“She gave me her phone number, though.”

“And that is how Nonni and I met!” Vinnie nods and falls silent.

Hazel pops onto all fours on the rug and shouts, “But what happened next?”

Lydia chimes in, “Yeah! What happened next?”

“Well,” Vinnie orchestrates the perfect suspenseful pause and then says, “I didn’t call her.”

Hazel shouts, “How rude, Poppi!”

“Very rude. I imagine she was disappointed. And maybe a little mad.”

Lydia shakes her head with disbelief. “Well, how did you ever fall in love with her?”

Hazel inquires further, “And get married?”

“Well, she called me a couple weeks later when she was home visiting Gigi. I guess I didn’t make a bad first impression after all.”

“Why would you, Poppi?” Hazel asks.

“Because I had a little too much liquid courage.”

Bode reaches up and takes Vin’s face in his little hands. “What’s liquid courage?”

“Well, I drank too many beers. I thought I needed them to be brave enough to talk to her.”

Hazel yells, “But you didn’t! You didn’t at all!”

“Why do you say that, Hazel?”

She replies, “Because Nonni had a crush on you too!”

I walk into the great room, like I’m accepting an Oscar, and say, “I really did!” I give Vinnie a kiss. My family applauds, hoots, and hollers.

I return to the present moment. I wrap the ornament in candy cane-striped paper and tie a red velvet ribbon around it. I feel the smooth velvet between my fingers, inspecting the asymmetry of the loops, and decide to leave them uneven. Vinnie and I used to joke about which version of the story we would tell our grandchildren, when we were old and gray, about how we met in a bar. This one is perfect.

Tarah Friend Cantore has published a non-fiction memoir incorporating her artwork in tough & vulnerable, in addition to her novel, Spiral Bound. Her poetry has been published in The Bluebird Word and in the Telling Our Stories Through Word and Image Anthology.

gray metal candle lantern on boat dock — Photo by Burak The Weekender on Pexels.com

A Good Night

22 October 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Paul Cummins

Already with thee, tender is the night.
John Keats, “Ode to a Nightingale”

Not fancy, not a dream—truly, Nancy kissed me goodnight,
Her lovely face lifting tenderly to meet mine,
That magical midnight, that innocent June,
Yes, she kissed me on the lips and I knew.

Then, with a strange new lightness to my gait,
I glided down her lawn to my moonlit Chevrolet,
Dizzying home in a popular-song sort of bliss—
Recalling a lifetime later the sweetness of that kiss.

So say to me whatever you may and know,
Say Paul, that day over half a century ago,
And I shall reply with enduring delight,
Beautiful Nancy kissed me that good night.

Paul Cummins is an educator, writer and social entrepreneur. From classroom teaching he went on to the founding and co-founding of six schools—including independent schools and a Public Charter School. From educational outreach programs to groundbreaking ventures, Cummins champions quality education, especially for at-risk, foster and incarcerated youth.

Reminder

22 October 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Travis Stephens

Scattered around town,
bolted to the backs of benches
or bus shelters or appearing
without apology in free magazines
are well composed photos of
a couple, plus the sans serif
“It’s time to talk about Alzheimer’s.”

Yes, you say, while we can.
Before we forget to, I offer,
teaming for another joke.
Or talk about it again, you smile,
Because we don’t remember
we already did.
We are walking to the taco truck
on Pico, the one with the dollar tacos.
Not big, but tasty. Plus cans of Coke
or Sprite or milky horchata.
You order for both of us, the men
at ease with your dark-eyed loveliness
& tolerant of my gray hair.

I’ve always looked older, fooled even you.
But I see that the back of my arm
now looks crepey, the spots on my
hands not freckles or ink. We sometimes
run the numbers to calculate what your
parents were doing at our age, living
in Palm Springs or travelling abroad.
Grandparents many times over & both
retired early—something I am reminded
of in my daily commute. Grandpa Tug,
the little one says, & points at the stencil
on my shirt. His small body
lodged between us on the couch as we read.
The daily arrival of joy, eyes fresh with wonder.
If we stumble over names, what to call
that thing, you know…thing, don’t worry.
We will talk about it later,
vow to remember, try not to forget.

Travis Stephens is a tugboat captain who resides with his family in California. Recent credits include: Gyroscope Review, 2River, Sheila-Na-Gig, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Raven’s Perch, Crosswinds Poetry Journal, Gravitas and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. Read his earlier poems in The Bluebird Word from April 2022 and September 2022.

Ruth and Oscar

12 August 2023 / Editor

Nonfiction by Angela Townsend

Ruth and Oscar have been married forty years, and they have drawn stares for every one.

Oscar, crafted exclusively of knees and elbows, is the word “jaunty” sprung to life. Eighty-six and five-foot-two, he commands eyes bluer than the Earth from space.

Oscar will neither retire from paid work nor stomach being told that he is in any way impressive. What he will do is elbow you, an instant co-conspirator in this majestic business of being awake, and call you “kid” until you wish it was your given name. His polo shirts are sky and indigo, bright enough to spot him across a century.

Statuesque at seventy-eight, Ruth is a cloud of concern, claiming herself unworthy of her white halo. Her mouth is mournful, and if she didn’t love you, she would distrust you when you insist she is one of the kindest people you know.

But Ruth does love you, almost enough to believe the unfathomable things you believe about her. Proficient in ganache and genealogy, she makes cold rooms feel like dens. She feeds strays, only a few of them feline, and lies awake worrying who might be alone this Thanksgiving. Ruth cried when she learned that introversion is an honest, honorable trait, not a shortcoming.

Oscar and Ruth have toilet paper emblazoned with the face of a political figure.

When Oscar sees me, he hugs me so tight I nearly need to have his elbows surgically removed. Ours was one of those instant bonds that makes you wonder if your families touch fingertips above the treeline. Far beyond DNA, Oscar is family now, equal parts scampish brother and Father Abraham.

Ruth learns through cautious eyes but raced through the pages of my affection like one of her Revolutionary War novels. For ten years she has been perplexed by my admiration, telling me I’m kinder than cats and twice as daft. But when Ruth sees Ruth in my mirror, the truth makes her taller, and she shines like God’s angel in her sturdy denim dress.

On my birthday, Ruth carefully lays out cards on her desktop computer, photos of their cats with wry bylines like, “Sage was going to wish you a happy birthday, but she had to eat her third breakfast instead.” I save every one.

Ruth and Oscar are the rare friends with whom I’ve discussed our rare friendship. None of us has any explanation for why we loved each other so quickly and entirely, only that we are very, very fortunate.

I had to downplay the distress of my divorce to Oscar, who shuddered with tears anyway, lip quivering. “This, to the best person we know!”

But Ruth and Oscar found each other after divorces of their own, pasts they don’t discuss, histories that had to happen for us to have Ruth and Oscar.

Oscar and Ruth give me hope.

Oscar and Ruth had better both reach one hundred years.

Angela Townsend is Development Director at Tabby’s Place and has an M.Div. from Princeton Seminary and B.A. from Vassar. Her work has appeared or will be published in upcoming issues of The Amethyst Review, Braided Way, Fathom Magazine, and Young Ravens Literary Review, among others. Angie loves life dearly.

Beauty

5 July 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Paul Hostovsky

The way her hands danced across the braille page, it was a beautiful choreography to behold. Her left hand beginning each line, handing it off to her right hand halfway across the page, the right hand finishing the line as the left moved down to begin reading the next line. Left hand to right hand to left hand to right hand. Expert, fleet, like a concert pianist, or like relay runners in a race, the handoff accomplished seamlessly over and over, line by line down the page, page by page through the book, book by book through his entire childhood.

There was never a time when he didn’t know it. He’d learned it with his ABCs, fingering the raised dots with his tiny hands, sitting in his mother’s lap as she read to him aloud from the print/braille children’s books while he looked at the pictures. B was but, C was can, D was do. M was more. M with a dot five in front was mother. White dots on a white page, but they cast these tiny shadows so he could see them in the light. Like a country of igloos as seen from an airplane on a sunny winter morning.

Having blind parents was as unremarkable as having breakfast in the kitchen, having mail in the mailbox, having rain on rainy days and sun in the summertime. Lending his mother or father his shoulder–his elbow as he grew taller–was like offering his arm to the sleeve of his own jacket, like giving his hand to his other hand. He thought nothing of it, didn’t even have a word for it until he started kindergarten and the word got spat on the ground by some ugly mouths on the playground, older boys snickering and pointing, mimicking his parents as they swept their white canes back and forth, back and forth. Click sweep, click sweep, click sweep.

Those white canes. At home they leaned quietly against the wall like backslashes in the unpunctuated dark. Or else they sat folded underneath a chair or table like bundles of long chalk, a red one in each. K was knowledge. P was people. And the braille dictionary in seventy-two volumes was stacked practically to the ceiling, like a cord of wood.

His mother would stop reading, open her watch then close it, click, reach under her chair for her cane and open it, chick-a-chick, into a white line which she swept across an invisible line which she walked, out the door and down the street to the grocery store. Q was quite, U was us.

Braille was dots in a cell, lots and lots of cells. Each cell was a three-story building at dusk, the lights on in certain windows, not others. Each book was a city, where he and his mother looked through the windows, their fingers pressed to the panes.

Outside it’s beginning to snow. And each snowflake is a different character in the Complete Works of Beauty, which contains no mistakes that he has ever been able to find. And he has looked—he has looked his whole life—but has never found a single mistake.

Paul Hostovsky makes his living in Boston as a sign language interpreter and Braille instructor. His latest book of poems is Pitching for the Apostates (forthcoming 2023, Kelsay Books). Website: paulhostovsky.com

Photo of Father's Coat (courtesy of author)

My Father’s Coat, in Three Acts

1 July 2023 / Editor

Nonfiction by Cheryl Sadowski

How old am I—four? five? awaiting my father’s arrival. I stare out the picture window of our living room watching snow fall like feathers when his car rolls into the driveway. The door swings open, and my mother cheerfully calls out. I see my father’s face and run headlong into his herringbone coat: it smells of spice, wool, and winter. I huddle against his legs and look down at his shiny black shoes. Whether or not my father loves his herringbone coat, or even likes it, I cannot say. Only that it is his.

So called for its resemblance to fish bones, herringbone is an interlocking pattern of zig-zag lines known for strength and durability. Ancient Egyptians borrowed the design from nature for their jewelry. Romans laid roads in a herringbone pattern. Herringbone tweed began as a working man’s cloth, serious and sturdy, to guard against the damp climates of Scotland and England.

My father’s coat is classic herringbone, tightly woven, with woolen Vs in black and gray, and an expertly tailored, glossy black lining. A sewn-in patch indicates provenance: Diamond’s Store for Men, a sartorial staple for professional attire during the 1960s and 70s.

For years the coat hangs in our cramped foyer closet amid a cadre of more flamboyant jackets: my mother’s Christmas cloak, my younger brother’s recreational wear, my high school letter jacket with a giant green ‘M’ emblazoned on the breast. I catch a glimpse of herringbone pattern—steadfast, stoic—whenever I grab my own coat and run out the door.

II.

My father’s coat accompanies me to college in Wisconsin, though I have no memory of asking him if I could take it. I wear it walking to classes, laughing and kicking through snow drifts with friends on the way to Ivan’s Pizza. Wisconsin winters are stark and cold. The herringbone acts like armor, blunting the sharp winds.

The coat is too big for me, but when I pair it with black biker boots and patterned tights, I love the way it makes me feel: artistic, complicated, like Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club. It is a warm, woolen talisman, cloaking me after nasty rows with my boyfriend. When I wear the herringbone with a pink velvet scarf, I am La Boheme! conjugating French verbs while I walk … je travaille, tu travailles, il travaille.

I recall a scene from Flaubert’s novel Madame Bovary: Emma Bovary, fresh from the winter air, lifts her hem to warm her foot by the fire, the allure and power of her well-revealed ankle. The hem of my father’s coat brushes over the tops of my boots when I walk. My calves are strong and young beneath its shelter. I saunter, sing-songing, insouciant, and free.

III.

It’s February. Seated on a cold, steel outdoor bench, I wait for the train. Beneath the elevated platform, office workers escape the manacles of cubicles and conference rooms. I, too, am tethered to the office, and to Chicago rents and utility bills. My father’s coat, now vintage, is admired by colleagues.

Snow sifts down through the mesh muslin sky. I raise the crook of my elbow to my nose and breathe in deeply. The coat’s fibers are still coarse and sturdy, the herringbone pattern so close, familiar. But the memory is thin, a wavering white veil between myself and my childhood.

I can’t see my father’s face to know if he is happy or tired or anxious. I long for the smell of spice, wool, and winter. My black biker boots are long gone, and I have no idea what became of my pink velvet scarf.

I reach back to the classroom: Nous travaillons. We are working.

The train approaches, a rushing ribbon of herringbone on iron wheels, unspooling, unstoppable. I stare at the long track ahead. It bends around the corner and disappears into the distance. Briefcase in hand, I rise and brush the snow from my lap. For the first time I notice that my father’s coat is heavy.

Cheryl Sadowski writes essays and short fiction that explore the connections of everyday life with landscape, literature, art, and the natural world. Her writing appears in About Place Journal, Vita Poetica, Orchards Poetry Journal, EcoTheo Review, Broadkill Review, After the Art, and Bay to Ocean Journal. She lives in Northern Virginia.

My one true love is golden like the sun

25 June 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Riley Davis

My one true love is golden like the sun
With specks of green like the fresh morning grass
Truly, for me you are the only one
That I will want forever in my grasp

I greedily want you all to myself
Since of you, there is not a great bounty
Although you are also selfish yourself
When I’ve had more than my fill, you hurt me

I love you when you are warm and fluffy
As everyone deems you should always be
I love you when you are cold and greasy
For I love you in all states, I decree

You nourish my heart and keep my soul fed
My true love for all of time: garlic bread

Riley Davis‘s eyes were first opened to the world of fiction with Harry Potter when she was eight, and they have not closed since. Although most of her creative work for her college career has been writing for games, she enjoys writing short stories and poems as well.

As Simple as That

30 May 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Dale Ritterbusch

My daughter sends me
a photograph of her cat, her lone cat,
lying on her bed next to two other
cats, her boyfriend’s cats
that have just moved in.

They seem to like being together,
no turmoil over the turf,
no petty jealousies
evinced as they lie there, resting
in a cat’s repose.

I think of times lying next to my wife,
just lying there, no movement,
merely an occasional touch,
a hand trailing lightly
along the arm, the shoulder.

It is as if we were cats;
nothing profound escapes our lips,
nothing of importance
to communicate, to fill the silence.

What is profound is the silence,
the touch, the recognition
that this space is filled,
that words are an unnecessary encumbrance
like an additional blanket
when we are already warmed enough.

Dale Ritterbusch is the author of four collections of poetry. He recently retired as a Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. His creative work is currently being archived in the Department of Special Collections at La Salle University.

Awakening

13 May 2023 / Editor

Poetry by N.T. Chambers

It was a late
Spring morning
the sun barely reddening
a drowsy sky –
our dog restlessly
asleep in his corner –
a quiet universe
within the room
undisturbed by events
yet to be
or the Sunday
one-half hour away.

You were
a sepia photograph
in a semi-darkened space–––
contorted on the sheets
with pillow-combed hair
gently caressing one cheek –
a singular bead of sweat
drifting silently
down your neck
as you turned over –
offering a dream-laden smile
to no one in particular.

I found myself wanting
to draw you closer
to inhale your night muskiness,
feel your breath on my chest,
but chose to honor your slumber –
there was coffee to make,
a paper to be retrieved,
pancakes to be cooked
and a lifetime to be shared

N.T. Chambers writes about the emotions, events, and experiences intrinsic to the human condition. Numerous works have been published in several journals and magazines, among them The Banyan Review, Inlandia, The Orchard Poetry Journal, The Decadent Review, New Note Poetry, Quibble Magazine, and Share Literary Journal.