TWITCHING THUMBS

The following poem, "the witch," appeared in a print anthology of New England poetry last year. I think. I got an acceptance letter, but no contributor's copy. The life of a writer. Anyway, Happy Halloween....


the witch

our neighbor
the widow mcdowell

--whose husband
worked hard for
sixty-odd years
was kind and quiet and
steady as they come
then spent his
retirement
running naked from the
groton town police—

used to set
baskets full of apples
from her own backyard
over the wall
and
into ours

my brother and i
would both yell
“witch!”
and run
into the house

looking back
i felt terrible
until i remembered
how she’d smile
when we ran
light right up
maybe even laugh

i realized
she wasn’t just
trying to be nice
but also
trying to
scare us to death

she did a
pretty good job
that witch
which
in a way
makes me
feel good too

________


Otherwise...

I'll have a short story published online tomorrow, another in December.

This morning, I hit page 87 on the adult Horror novel, NOW AND THEN. Itching to finish so I can revise the YA Horror novel I just wrote.

As for drawing, I'm about to do some serious work on negative space. I started an album called ART? at my facebook account to track my progress.