Robin on the lawn. Three hops and stops to listen. Somewhere must be spring. Donal Mahoney

It will be a while before Fred’s hometown has its annual food drive, he told me. That’s an important event because it helps stock the pantry at the small charity where he volunteers. Ri...

Used to be she’d tell him what to get at the grocery store and he always brought it back. Now she makes a list.

Phone rings. Wilbur answers it. “This is Grace. Is Thelma there?… “No,” says Wilbur. “She’s out won… “You mean wandering about?” ‘No, she used to wander about. No…

We write the stories of our lives between the bookends of birth and death They stay on the shelf

Two grackles, black birds shiny and iridescent, nest again this year high and deep in our tall spruce.

A tractor trailer with slats and m… pulls up at a city slaughterhouse. The driver pulls the wrong lever and two thousand pounds of trotting cattle go for an easy

First time seeing this doctor, a specialist. Took a month to get an appointment. The waiting room’s packed. I grab the last seat

Should she write about the wonders of nature and say it’s okay to lie on the beach forever without any sunscreen

Time’s a jet plane when you’re young. You go to school get a good job marry someone nice

Midnight in San Francisco. Yoshiko is 93 and she can’t sleep so she sits in her recliner and nibbles on a rice cake,

When will you understand it’s all about me. The world we live in whirls around my axis. Once you understand

A student asks the old poet why he has spent so many years writing. The old poet says no one’s asked him that before. He needs a minute to answer.