Posts by Sean Glatch
Come Back
in your hospital gown bleached gray as an old dog’s beard, the robe hanging from the anvil of your back, gnarled feet in paper slippers. I’ll float you away on a carpet of bed sheets. Paddle-boat to the edge of a gently sighing lake. Speed you away on skates. Do you remember the book of…
Read MoreWhile my Mother Dreams of Judge Judy
I dream, too. In this dream, Judy’s rage ruffles the quiet cut-outs of her collar. Madame! she shouts at the teen mother whose boyfriend’s Pitbull bites. First the boyfriend and his infected tattoo. Then his five kids. Then the biting dog. My mother’s telling Judy about her girlhood mutt, Shadow, a dark cannonball rolling across…
Read MoreBeach Walk
I watched the surfers this morning. A ballet of arrowheads floated over jade glass, Cormorants as audience dove alongside. They remind me of the Bongo Board, mom balanced barefooted in our den, on a seesaw of sorts, auburn hair flipped at the shoulder, red luster upstages fluorescents of a Pucci minidress, her satin slingbacks dyed…
Read MoreFaces
My granddaughter’s eyelashes are arcs of fringe at the edge of her lids as she stares down at a sheet of paper, her right hand, intent on capturing the two dogs’ faces, guides a pen: Frida with her sugar-cone-shaped snout and triangular ears, inky coat a dead match for her eyes, orbs only visible when…
Read MoreTo Magic
Every mother dreams of the day her daughter gets married. She prays it’s to a man that will love her with all his heart. A man who will take on the role of head of her family with certainty and a little fear. Someone who desires to uplift and encourage her. Today, I am overjoyed…
Read MoreBefore a Honolulu Sunset
Every evening, my father strolled along the Ala Wai canal before dinner. Once, during a visit, he leaned over and whispered, I have a surprise. Accompanied by the scent of pikake, we walked along the Ala Wai to a convenience store, and sat down on a wooden bench facing an ancient banyan tree filled with…
Read MoreStick Figures
12Grandmother. Ten years old and I’m kneeling on the carpet next to her. She smells like flowers with English Garden names: peony, jasmine, narcissus; she smells like black and white movies, where heroines smoke PallMalls like they mean it. She grips the pins between smudged red lips, her breath coming in emphysematic wheezes, moving on…
Read MoreThe Artichoke Women
I love the smell of Artichokes cooking. It’s earth in a boiling pot. It is memories of adults when I wasn’t. It’s the women in my family sitting around a long table, in a small room, pulling leaves, speaking loudly (Don’t hit your sister) and low (Did you hear what Andy did to Maria?) and…
Read MoreLeaving Words Behind
It all started with a walk and a dog The dog, Kukui, with his tail that whirls like a helicopter Brisk little legs to lead us down the street his morning business completed with a flourish of kicking I had forgotten my part: no doggie bags at hand Thus a trip back and forth A…
Read More10 Things Every Children’s Picture Book Writer Should Know
Picture books—don’t they conjure up happy memories? Maybe you have read them to your kids. Maybe you recall them being read to YOU. Remember having favorites that you wanted to read over and over? Goodnight Moon, The Cat in the Hat, The Story of Ferdinand? Perhaps as an adult, you still love picture books, and…
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