Alphabet
Bad Apple
Black with White Stripes
Envy
Erosion and the Laetoli Footprints
Evening Before the Diagnosis
Freelance
Holding On
Moose Prayer
Mute Ghost of Your Grandfather
My Two Voices
Wild Edibles
You Wish This Were a Novel
自強號 (zì qiáng hào)
Holding On
Donna Vorreyer
When my wisdom teeth were pulled, the deep roots
lay bloody in the plastic tray. Everything roots—
tooth in the mouth, the mangrove tree bending
to sip the brackish bay with its roots.
My grandmother paid us a penny for each dandelion
we pulled, but only if we had its root.
Otherwise, they’ll come back, she said. If you want
a thing to die, you must kill it at the root.
When my mother died, my father withered,
became untethered, her heart his taproot.
I pull and peel the beets for pickling, the red
seeping into my skin, blood of the root.