a hundred rooms

The attic kept a winter smell of pennies, dust, and thread.
I climbed there often as a child and named the dark instead.

the art of breaking

Her thumb falls into her cereal.

She hears it first—a small crack like ice splitting—then watches it drop. It lands in the milk with a soft plunk, bobbing next to a cluster of soggy flakes.

the broken one

he lines his cars along the quilt. one red, one blue, one missing a wheel and nudges them forward in soft little bumps so they climb the hill of her knees

gridlock

He touched down on a Tuesday afternoon in the middle of downtown’s gridlock gospel. Small wings. White sneakers. Pink hoodie with a cheap satin sheen. The bow was gone.

i shot an angel

I shot an angel with my father’s rifle.

the oldest profession

Rain dragged silver veins down the windows. Candlelight swam across the ceiling in bruised gold. Silk curtains breathed from the cracked pane, pale as drowned skin. Men enter the room starving.