Author Archives: janishaag

We’re fellow travelers on a moonlit road through the night country, where there’s never any rush hour.—Frank Bruni, opinion writer, The New York Times ••• The 3:45 a.m. email gets sentlike a flashlight SOS in the night— three rapid flashes,then … Continue reading →

You won’t remember this,though your dearest ones willsomeday show you old photos, but on your first Easter youdid not hunt for eggs or have a basket,though you were in a kind of basket for a time—your happy placebackpack on your … Continue reading →

Who do you pray to whenyou don’t believe in God? she asks. And somehow, jaw tightening,you bite down on the blurt—Whom!—the correction slidingdown your throat like sweet cream, for you are no longer in teacher mode,and your spine straightens, yourwings … Continue reading →

Heya, little slug, how’d you end up crawlingacross a dirty, cat-footeddish towel on the kitchen counter this rainy night? As if I don’t know, Diego having wandered in allsoggy from a who-knows-wherenap, undeterred by wet or mudbetween his toes, to, … Continue reading →

Good Friday 2024 We’ve becomehallowed vessels of mercylined with graceafter being hollowed outby the swift kick of departure, imagining the vanishedbeloveds poofed intonothingness, when nothingcould be less true. It happens, they try to tell us,that they live on in particlesof … Continue reading →

Leave your worries on the padbeside the bed—maybe it’s on the bednext to the cat curled into oblivion. She can sleep. Why can’t you? The pad, the journal, the pagecan take whatever you throw on it.It’s a sturdy thing, after … Continue reading →

We’d walk to the driveway next doorto wait on chilly mornings, be droppedoff there on getting-hot afternoons, the hulking orange school bus creakingto a hard stop, Mrs. Capps with heriron-muscled forearm cranking the big handle that opened the door—not a … Continue reading →

There is someone waiting for you… Driving west to pick her up,I look skyward at fat sheep-fluffyclouds bordered by wispy white oneswhere a hazy angel shimmers,wings outstretched, a virga cloud of celestial dropletsagainst the blue. There is someone waiting for … Continue reading →

Now that there’s something to see out there,spring springing, bugs bugging, sky blue-ing,I’m looking through windows that could use a good wash—on my car, which allof a sudden are bird-splatted. This didn’thappen all winter. Now the fly-bys decide to alight … Continue reading →

My friend Lauratold me about writing poems on bathroom mirrors withdry erase markers— the rainbow ones being most fun—so I’m giving it a try— six new colors rainbowingdown my reflection, no idea, as always, wherethe words will take me, which … Continue reading →