After a record-breaking season of rain, the five-year mega drought in California was over. Atmospheric rivers and bomb cyclones rolled inland, brought steel gray skies, charcoal clouds, and torrents of water. Snow wrapped mountaintops, and for a brief moment, it seemed all would be well. But the relentless sun grew hotter than ever before. The snow melted and the streams, rivers, and waterfalls gushed to the valley below. And there emerged a ghost lake, Tulare Lake, onc...| The Bookends Review
Some time ago, while walking up 8th Avenue in the black night hours, I nonchalantly crossed the empty road, heading for home. What seemed like out of nowhere, a car came barreling at me. I froze in the middle of the street. The driver passed so close, the door handle brushed against me. The rear tires locked, causing the car to skid and fan towards the far curb, scratching the paint of a parked Chrysler before careening back across the lanes, swiping another parked car and losing one of i...| The Bookends Review
Why bother bending utensils when you can bend minds, bend limbs, bend roads? We pulse from city to city, light streaks even a map can’t catch. Sammich sustenance absorbed in rest stops with carelessly locked bathrooms and landscaped-area flowers flaking color into the absence of light. At least the sprinkler timers are working. The visitors from the Continent stitch the air in my car with vexation over how to locate themselves in/on Google while I creep streets striated in freezing pr...| The Bookends Review
A piercing morning sun promised no relief but only more heat as the carefully tanned woman stood waiting with the little girl in her overly heavy dress and orthopedic shoes. The woman was sporting faux haute couture in crisp white shorts and a mind-blowing bright blue halter, her blonde hair carefully arranged in a silky ponytail. Delicate leather sandals with a troublesome strap were a bit loose, but she loved the look. Sunglasses, not Bentley Platinum but knockoffs, shielded her eyes from t...| The Bookends Review
We cry, with the throb of deception,Because we’ve seen the tongue of deceit, without exception.We cry, and we feel guilt,Because we’ve spat the words of trickery ourselves, knowing what it would wilt.And so, we speak in feathers of white, to cover our scarring words,Even when we know white lies can so easily be tainted by the song of black birds. But why can’t we speak in different shades of light?Periwinkle lies, so soft and pure it would chirp with joy even through the darkest of nigh...| The Bookends Review
It would be love after a few sights. Last Tuesday, she caught my eye again, and I caught hers back. I’ll probably ask her to prom – betraying the pact made with my two closest friends, to go together rather than with dates – but I need the confirmatory third or fourth sight of her. Then I’ll tell her that I fancy her. With the frenzy of two months before prom dominating classroom and corridor conversation, our minds are occupied. We’re unusually busy. Much to our teachers’ dismay,...| The Bookends Review
What shook them loose from those grim days, news from my mother’s uncle domiciled in Australia, a firelight dream, some cinematic malarkey, a maggot, or just bad memories? Emotionally ransacked in hospital waiting rooms and cemeteries, the economy’s renewal slower than my mother’s stoic sighs, she read my great-uncle’s blue aerogrammes, creative non-fiction right to the thin pages’ edges and along the sides like ant trails. An example of English parsimony, or adventure? Did my...| The Bookends Review