Joy Manesiotis

The church steeple swims up through deepening green, submerged, the clock's hands rusting at ten past six, and the bell's clapper drifts back and forth, unable to strike the metal sides with any force. The red tile roof of the rectory opposite clouds [...]

Christmas Eve I get the call from your family, asking me to write a "bio"—for what? for the funeral home, but you are not yet dead, barely skirting, the edge of a coma, circling the dark lake: are you walking around it to keep it from going in or s [...]