GhoulieJoe

On Barbies and Stephen King

I recently gave my three-year-old daughter her first Barbie doll. Part of me felt guilty, since Barbies are associated with body image issues. I’ve thought about it in depth, and I’ve realized that I don’t hate my body because I played with Barbies as a kid. I never thought an eleven-inch-tall toy with rubber hands,Continue reading “On Barbies and Stephen King”

Apple (microfiction)

It is hot in the basement. They are dizzy. The air is thick with the sermon. The lesson is everlasting; the food supply is not. The apples are rotting. The minister’s teeth bared, he shrieks about God’s hatred and wrath. He will not let them go. It is hot in the basement.

Shadow Self (poem)

She’s fourteen. Medium height, slender, waist-length hair as blue as her eyes. She once broke her bed with a baseball bat. Cuts her arms with kitchen knives. Pounds the wall until bruises blossom on her knuckles like poison flowers. Misanthrope, she seethes and boils at the foolishness of others. She hates everyone. Alone at nightContinue reading “Shadow Self (poem)”

Peace (poem)

Seeing her lying there Clean white sheets Penned in by bars So small and helpless I can almost pretend She’s just napping Like when she was new. She needed me then She needs me now To be her strength, her mercy To sever the cord That connects her to me Like when she was new.Continue reading “Peace (poem)”

Every Day (poem)

Every day I peer into the bathroom mirror, trying to like the woman I see. I hate my flat, thin hair. My friend has beautiful hair. It dazzles, her beautiful blonde curls haloing her face in soft waves. She has it done professionally; it costs over a hundred dollars and takes three hours. I’ve lostContinue reading “Every Day (poem)”

Yum (microfiction)

She sits at the picnic table in their backyard, chewing on a chicken leg. She knows her husband will not approve; he says she has been getting fat. There he is now, in the window. His eyes are bulging, and his pointy teeth are bared. She bares her teeth back at him, and resumes eating.

Red (microfiction)

She remembers his shirt was red, like the paint on his canvas. He had offered to show her more of his work, wanting her opinion. Then nothing. Red behind her eyes. She awakened in a windowless cell. She tried scratching her way out. Now her fingertips were red. She wondered if he’d paint her.

Please (microfiction)

She’s thirsty. Some water, to rid the taste of him in her mouth. She pauses, the cup halfway to her lips. A noise, under his snoring. She sees his arm, stretching impossibly long, coming from the bedroom. “Where are you?” “What are you doing?” Stretching around her, pulling tighter. And tighter. She drops the glass.

Penance (microfiction)

Dinner, the three of them. Mother asks her son-in-law if he ever feels guilty about his past, the mistakes he made, the surgeries when he lost patients. He says nothing but bites his thumb. She hears the crack of bone, sees the blood squirt onto her meatloaf. “I’ll take that as a yes,” Mother says.

The Hornet Field (microfiction)

In the hornet field green and blue are overwhelmed by brown and yellow. All is drone and bustle. In the hornet field eggs are dangerous. Hatchlings fight with deadly precision. I draw my sword and cross the threshold. I hum their tune and ready myself for battle. They’ll never take me alive.