Author Archives: janishaag

Seven years after,I can’t count how manytimes I look at you in a moment of fleetingirritation, when the blueof your eyes shimmers just so, as it did whenthey blinked openthe day I lost you, and you returnedthanks to the help … Continue reading →

There’ll be a sign. Of course, there’ll be a sign.It’ll be subtle, but it will find you if you open your heart and let the wind blow through.Hope can look like winter-bare trees showing tiny bumps of buds-to-be, or a … Continue reading →

(for Dick Schmidt, aka Uncle Duck,in honor of National Rubber Ducky Day) When, as little kids, your niece and nephewchristened you Uncle Duck, giggling overthe clever wordplay, you were stuck. Forever after, ducks appeared for birthdaysand Christmases, many of them … Continue reading →

It never had a formal namescripted across its stern.It was just “the boat,”or, since his demise,“Dad’s boat,” though it was Mom’s color,turquoise across the broadbow and interior with whiteundercarriage, late ’60s Silverline Rambler—which shared the garagewith the turquoise Ramblerstation wagon— … Continue reading →

Doesn’t have to be much,just a few lines, I often tell people tryingto write one. Or in the words of a poetI greatly admire, It doesn’t have to be good—it just has to be true. So we set down the … Continue reading →

As Jupiter reaches opposition—when the giant of this solar systemlies between our blue marble and the sun— I will look up at nightfall and trackits progress across the winter sky,closer than ever to Earth, bright as a star. And should … Continue reading →

It’s been decades since I lustedafter a particular pool. My sister and I,young synchronized swimmers, fell hard for the Neptune poolon our first visit to Hearst Castle,and dreamed of doing ballet legs in that aqua water surroundedby a pseudo-Greek temple. … Continue reading →

(at the Ocotillo Lodge, Palm Springs, California) Here, they negotiate the wicked thornsto perch in earth-toned camouflage on the spears arrowing out of the groundat the corner of our building. One moment I catch the zip of a tinywinged being, … Continue reading →

Indian Canyons, Palm Springs, California ••• The shaggy elders in this oasisbring to mind winterized buffaloon the Great Plains, their snow-coatedhides bulked up against the cold. But, more appropriately in this warmclimate, the dead fronds featheringtheir lower regions look to … Continue reading →

They used to say about informing onsomeone, about ratting someone out,the ten-cent piece being the costto make a call on a pay phone. Only now, only here, in this tram stationon a craggy mountain, it’s two quarters,which puzzles the young … Continue reading →