murderapolis
I’m currently working on a book of intertwined true stories called "Murderapolis." That was the nickname of Minneapolis when I lived there in the nineties. I’m not quite sure what genre it falls into; it’s a memoir in that everything in it happened to me and near me, but it’s less about me than about the neighborhood I come from and the people within it. The book is about the true devotion that arises from trauma bonding, the hysterical laughter that arises from grief. Most of all, it’s a love story to a time and a place that formed me. While each chapter is a story by itself, they all build upon each other to tell a larger story of the struggle to survive and maybe even love after enduring seemingly endless heartache.
This project has been supported by the UCross Foundation and Millay Arts.
A young woman tries to function in the present while her attention is caught reliving the past. In New Letters, Volume 49, 2023 Non-fiction. (Nominated for a Pushcart Prize).
Excerpt: “You don’t know! You don’t fucking know!” said Jerry Kummer. “Why don’t you try being me for fifty-five years? Then you might know something!” He was sidled up to the counter, red face, big coat, uneven stubble, hat with a huge pompom on top, drinking a Jolt Cola, his favorite drink. The label read: “all the sugar and twice the caffeine.”
Outside, night was falling fast. It was so cold that the huge plate glass window was blocked white with ice and the only thing you could see out were the lights of cars going by brightening the whiteness for a moment before they were gone. But inside it was warm, even hot, especially where Jerry and I were, steam rising from the espresso machine, the coffeemaker, the dishwasher. Jerry sat at the end of the bar, his regular seat and shouted at the other regular customers as they walked in.
What I do to people
who don’t love me
A young woman grapples with death and love while drunk out of her skull at a funeral. Pleiades Magazine. Non-fiction
Excerpt: Elysium lay sprawled on the couch like she was waiting to be taken, but nobody seemed to notice. The swooning forearm thrown casually over her brow and her knock-kneed legs falling wide apart barely caught anyone’s attention.
It was hard to tell if she was passed out or just weeping. Suddenly, she opened her eyes, looked around long enough to register shock and disbelief, then fell to the ground in full wail. She buried her mouth in the long red carpet and screamed. She leaned back again, her face, though dark, visibly reddened by grief. She ran her hands through her dreadlocks, now dyed blue; cheap mascara ran down all the way down her face to the two tattooed lines, like the hollows of a fiddle, on her throat. Another gutter punk, Little Bob, his head shaved bald, sat on the floor with her and cried too. When she went down for her next screaming sob, he tapped her on the shoulder and as she got up he handed her a drink— straight vodka.