Photo by Mateusz Butkiewicz on Unsplash
by Jeff Friedman
When the wind came, trees bent and branches fell. The birds disappeared, but we could hear them calling. Our big round clock stopped at 3 AM. Mimi was trapped in an invisible net as if a spider had caught her, her hazel eyes beaming like signals. I crawled toward her to free from her restraint, but the floor was covered in grease, grease all over my hands and face, and I kept slipping. Then it was quiet for a long time.
JEFF FRIEDMAN has published eleven collections of poetry and prose. His work has appeared in American Poetry Review, five successive times in Best Microfiction, and in The New Republic. He has received an NEA Literature Translation Fellowship and numerous other awards.
