Essays, nonfiction, and short fiction.
Letters to my Daughter: July 2, 2018
I buy our clothes from thrift stores, eyes lowered with you balanced on my right hip. Every Thursday there's a 25 percent military discount. I push through clusters of clear plastic hangers, an endless quilt dulled under fluorescent lighting, you point at strangers behind us.
Letters to my Daughter: May 12, 2017
Your father left us twice and I was never the same. The first time was when I told him I was pregnant with you. The second time was after two weeks of living together and he told me he didn't love me. We were a burden to him — he lost sleep and his blood pressure was high. I vacillated between numbness and feeling sick with grief.
Letters to my Daughter: May 2, 2017
I'm sat cross-legged next to you and you're swimming. Small creases encircle your wrists and ankles and I'm mesmerized by them. You hold them in the air and groan, body tense with your head above the quilt I placed on the floor for us. I want to remember you like this always. A little person struggling to make headway across a seemingly insurmountable square of fabric. Your gusto. The way you rest by clutching Bunny under your chin and nibble on his ear.
Letters to my Daughter: February 4, 2017
No one taught me how to be a mother. Your small cries tore me in half and I'll never be the same again. You smelled like sweet cream against my chest the first time I held you. Numb from the waist down, doctors and nurses calmly cleared the pool of blood you left behind. An older friend cut the cord and I was exhausted. It took me over 30 hours, two epidurals and a kind of pain I can't describe. Other women have told me they've forgotten labor pains. I don't believe them — I remember everything.
Letters to my Daughter: September 19, 2016
I don’t feel time anymore and my self deprecation gets me through the day. No one wants to know about my bouts of insomnia or how surreal it is to feel the rhythm of your hiccups inside me because I’m alone. I’ve spent months collecting trinkets and clothes for you like a rotund magpie.
Letters to my Daughter: August 15, 2016
It’s warm outside, the kind of heat that envelops you, but it’s more comfortable than the artificial coolness inside the house. I feel you throughout the day and it’s hard to believe you’re a part of me. My breasts and stomach are swollen, I’ve bought loose fitting tops to accommodate you, I’ve donated several pairs of shoes to Goodwill and spend too much of my morning trying to make sense of what I’ve dreamt. Your fist pushes against my ribs and I press back with my fingertips below my sternum.
Letters to my Daughter: May 22, 2016
he ultrasound equipment thumped rhythmically next to me as I watched your small transparent legs pump beneath you on an outdated black and white screen. The nurse gave me cold moist wipes to clean the lubricant off my stomach and blurry screen captures ground out on cheap paper like a series of receipts from the grocery store. I wanted to replay that moment over and over.