Essays

As I imagined myself racing against Olympic skaters, my fingertips tingling as I gained speed, I forgot about being the only brown girl at an almost all white school.

The Battle of Hastings was fought in 1066.

My father would say that, and my mother would glance at him sideways, and then down, with a smile that suggested she had some kind of secret.

My island is ugly. Bare and bleak. It rises from the earth, fifteen feet high and dimpled like a camel’s hump, ringed by acres and acres of corn; an ocean of sweet Indian gold.

Shannon tapped her pencil on the desk, trying to command my attention.

I’ve been on both sides of the speed-dating table at Push to Publish.

The first time you saw me
naked, I was standing in front of the refrigerator.

“I see death’s door opening!”

When I look at my nine year- old son, I see my husband's face. His square jaw, his chiseled cheekbones, his light brown hair, his delicate, perfectly proportioned nose.

I watched my old man’s face, hoping he wouldn’t notice my chubby fingers creeping toward the volume knob.

"A ghost isn't alive. Not in the way we think of something being alive."