Archive
Three Fragments
by Eric Burke
A medium-sized Cooper’s hawk
rests on the fence behind our garbage cans.
I continue to set out seeds,
continue to clean the bath.
*
Before moving in
I salted the yard with vinegar.
Still, they grew.
My wife wanted a landscape artist
to harmonize the colors and scents.
I demurred.
We settled
for randomness.
*
Familiar objects (furnace, fridge) begin to shudder
each time they shut down.
I brace myself for the inevitability of reproach.
Eric Burke works as a computer programmer in Columbus, Ohio. More of his work can be found in elimae, decomP, Camroc Press Review, qarrtsiluni, A cappella Zoo, and Weave Magazine. You can read his blog at anomalocrinus.blogspot.com.
The Convert
by Eric Burke
In her new life, she was like a nation.
This was how she felt. She was beginning
to feel the responsibility of being many,
of having pasts
from which she could separate herself,
of having harmed many
but of being now innocent.
So, around her past, she stepped
carefully, with a hesitation
that felt like subtlety,
like nuance,
to her.
Eric Burke (blog) works as a computer programmer in Columbus, Ohio. Recent work can be found in elimae, Pank, A cappella Zoo, decomP and Bloody Bridge Review.
Pay Asclepius a Cock
by Eric Burke
My father wasn’t really sick. He was only pretending. (Though his need to pretend might be a sickness. At least, that’s what he liked to think.) He was very tired.
My mother was melodramatic. She said my father was melodramatic. I never really believed her.
My sister left home early to marry a man who looked like he knew what he wanted.
I never left home. I make my own bed. I lie in it, as comfortable as anyone ever really is.
Eric Burke works as a computer programmer in Columbus, Ohio. Recent work can be found in elimae, Pank, Right Hand Pointing, decomP, Otoliths, and Heron. Work is forthcoming in A cappella Zoo. He blogs at Anomalocrinus Incurvus.
qarrtsiluni 