Dispatches | Page 14

Old Home, Mother’s Home

August 24, 2016 Dispatches

Every summer, we boarded the sleeper-train from Shanghai to Jiangxi and I squeezed through the crowds to claim the top bunk in a tight compartment shared with two strangers. The train always smelled of feet and instant noodles, and I loved the 16-hour journey because it was the only time I was allowed to have the MSG-flavored noodles. I rolled onto the scratchy bleached sheets that stuck to my sweaty body, and pressed my head against the cool metal bar to peek out the window, upside-down. Rocking to the train’s steady sway, I felt the soft, comforting crease of the cash my mother had sewn into my underwear against my thighs, in case of pickpockets. Meanwhile, she sat bent on the bottom bunk, purse clutched to chest, glancing up at my dangling head and legs, muttering, “Behave, you are a city girl.”

Hops

July 13, 2016 Dispatches

By STEPHEN LYONS

When we were young, white, and poor, we were handed dull machetes. At first light, in the back of half-ton grain trucks, we rode past the peppermint fields and the pear orchards of southern Oregon. We were strangers thrown together like dice in a cup. Some of us smoked quietly or blew the steam off the tops of take-out coffee containers. Others sipped whiskey from dented flasks or spit tobacco into plastic bottles. In ratty plaid shirts, torn dungarees, and worn out boots we looked the part of migrant workers. We would work twelve hours with half-hour lunch breaks that felt like no break at all. At the end of our shift we were older, more broken, and still in debt.

The Almost-Perfect Lazy Visit

June 29, 2016 Dispatches

By KERRY JAMES EVANS

Finally, we sleep well, where the walls lean

with a drunk’s articulation. We wake

to homemade apple pies and hot cocoa.

We talk through a day of Rummy and three

An Appointment with a Particular Tree

June 15, 2016 Dispatches

By KERRY JAMES EVANS

Where am I, tracing lines in the bark

of an oak, a name

I have yet to forget?

It wasn’t love, this

half-attempt, my breathing in

the dust, the fire ants

lock-stepping down

Drought

June 1, 2016 Dispatches

By KERRY JAMES EVANS

My neighbor Geraldine

runs her sprinkler

like a public fountain.

The kids run through hollering

when all that dead grass

stabs their little plum feet,

Spring, New York: Pt. 2

April 20, 2016 Dispatches

By KIRK MICHAEL

This is the second part of a two-part Dispatch. The first part is available here.

I navigate by haphazard emotion, glancing over the wonderful cards that describe the provenance of the art, the investments of the rich across centuries. Willem Claesz Heda’s “Still Life with Oysters, a Silver Tazza, and Glassware” has what the title says it has and also a stamped checkerboard knife fitted for Old Dutch clutches, Schermerhorns buying up property on the docks of New York, New Amsterdam, monochrome banquet pieces slapped onto walls like flatscreens, overturned chalices and cutlery, tarnish and husk, the bitter translucent lemon dripping gold leaf citrus, succulent on the table, the pip as acidic as the pupils in my eyes.

Spring, New York: Pt. 1

April 18, 2016 Dispatches

By KIRK MICHAEL

This is the first part of a two-part Dispatch. The second part is available here.

“Beginnings are always delightful; the threshold is the place to pause.

My luggage trips over the pavement and the brownstone bella vista is dappled by trees I will soon learn are called Callery Pears, the ones that smell of semen, vulgar but pleasing, high on the listicle of “Disgusting Smelling New York Trees, Ranked,” a sign that I have finally arrived in Brooklyn in proper spring, the jizzy crush of it.

Karakoram Post

March 30, 2016 Dispatches

By KANYA KANCHANA

Delhi, Dharmshala, McLeod Ganj, Dharmkot. New friends and newer friends over masala chai. Deodar forest in rain. Mist rising. Monkeys on a cold tin roof, scorpions in the corridor, beetles inside clothes, slugs the size and shape of fallen leaves. Clean, spare, sharply elegant—Vipassana. Silence. Thank you for all the blessings, they came in handy.

Nighthawks Down Under

March 2, 2016 Dispatches

By WESLEY STRATON

On our first date he took me to a bar disguised as an apartment. Down a narrow alley (they call them laneways there), up a step, through a door marked “1A.” The room was small and nearly empty, all dark wood and white walls. A fire did its quiet work in one corner, its light gleaming on the unlabeled bottles that lined the shelves. He knew everyone, and the beautiful, tattooed bartenders spoke to me like family.

Rabbit’s Foot

February 19, 2016 Dispatches

By SAGE CRUSER

My dad’s black mutt slunk up to the front porch, looking slowly back and forth and crouching down low to the ground. I knew that body language: she was unsure of how a gift she had for us would be received. Her mouth was full of something. “Spit it out, girl,” I commanded. She gently separated her jaws and rolled a small brown ball of fur off her tongue. It was a wild baby rabbit, so small that at first I thought it was a mouse. But then I saw its ears and pink nose, and, as any nine-year-old girl would, I jumped and let out a squeak. Then I composed myself by taking a deep breath and patted my dog on the head. “Good girl, Macy. I’ve got it from here.”

All posts tagged: Dispatches

Old Home, Mother’s Home

Hops

The Almost-Perfect Lazy Visit

An Appointment with a Particular Tree

Drought

Spring, New York: Pt. 2

Spring, New York: Pt. 1

Karakoram Post

Nighthawks Down Under

Rabbit’s Foot

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