My poem, Story, was just published by Slant—a Journal of Contemporary Poetry. here is the poem:

Story

I read the last page
more than once
delaying for a time
the final closure —

when the book finds
a place on my shelves —
just another trophy.
So much pleasure

and no sequel.
Who doesn’t love
a good story — who doesn’t
love the storyteller

whose ancestors
kept the spirits away
from the fire
by spinning a web of creation?

I tell stories
thinly disguised as poems
about people and places
I might have known once.

Listen, I say,
here’s one
about my errant granny
who went missing

one weekday afternoon
while hunting for seeded rye.
We mobilized the neighborhood,
except for my dad

who whispered “good riddance”
under his breath.
We found her in Louie’s
sipping scotch,

mesmerizing the regulars
with tales of an old
country, she had never
actually lived in.

Tell me a story please,
with timing and plot
and people so real
I can even believe they’re dancing.