Short Creative and Copy
Poem
Northampton
Twenty years ago, on a
last, rainy day of class,
I left my red, ten-speed Schwinn
against an iron fence,
barely dismounting,
like I was coming back in ninety minutes.
Yesterday, I saw it again.
Someone had taken it in
removed the rust
scraped the mud
replaced the seat
fixed the gears
filled the tires
and locked it to that fence.
They can have it.
Flash Fiction
I woke up this morning to the face of a dead celebrity.
The timer on my TV goes click, and at that moment my eyes open to the face of the newly dead. The voice compares him to a bear, or elk, or some large animal.
Minutes later, I walk to the bakery/deli/ice cream shop around the corner for my coffee. There’s a lady sitting in the first booth eating a banana split and reading the obituaries.
Two signs are enough - no need to wait for the third.
I call in sick on the spot. Go back home, throw on the swimsuit, get in the car, drive with the windows down. No NPR, no college radio -- it's Top 40 today. Air pops in my ears to the Beat. Sun. Breeze. Sound.
In no more than 20 I’m in the center of Walden Pond, floating on my back, hearing my fluids swish, looking at the blue, blue, blue sky and rim of evergreen, I think: this is what I want to see when I go.
Just then, I swear to it, this huge goldfish, maybe some kid’s goldfish from long ago, swims right past me, like it’s no big thing.
And for some weird reason, I feel better about it all.