Old Isaac

My father’s voice
had the cold sharpness
of a butcher’s knife and sank
into my neck
with a force that shocked
the legs on which I knelt,
the arms tied behind me,
to a shudder so total
I became nothing.
I am far older than he was then;
this poem, this rusty blade
smeared with my blood,
is what remains.

Boat Dream

I am a boat
made of words,
folded out of paper,
sailing across the kitchen
floor, a flat linoleum
sea flooded with light.
Mary leaves our bedroom,
stretches in her nightshirt,
walks to the kitchen, scoops
me with a wave of her palm
to her face, smooth and bright,
and opens her mouth to read
me out loud.

I live in Manhattan and write in a variety of genres. My most recent publication was poetry, two poems in the Brooklyn Rail in its last December/January issue, and I have a short short story upcoming at the Star 82 Review out of San Francisco. My fiction has also appeared in such journals as the Southwest Reivew and Manoa. I have had poems in the Jewish Spectator, Statorec.com and elsewhere. I also write journalism, mostly about the arts, often for the Los Angeles Times, Poets & Writers and other publications.