2021 theme: RUPTURE

Page 100

DESCEND Driek Zirinsky I sign the permissions, hand my life over to strangers. I kiss you goodbye, take the elevator down to the operating assembly line, the door closes with a hiss. Down there I weigh in and strip of everything I brought with me, even my wedding ring as if I am being born in reverse, a naked thing without a mother to comfort me. I am laid out on my gurney inside a curtained cubicle and hear urgent voices, the squeak of rubber soles on linoleum, the tear of another curtain. They are next. The nurse tells me her name, struggles to ind a good vein for the iv. Already I am bloodless, a spirit thing trailing lines of tubes so I will not get lost. The surgeon rips my curtain back. He wears a dark suit, like a movie star. He says it’s a long wait today, they are behind schedule. He marks the site with a Sharpie. If anything is a mistake, it will not be that.

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MEET THE WRITERS

11min
pages 181-190

ABOUT

1min
pages 179-180

Exhale

1min
pages 171-172

Ten Seconds to Rupture

6min
pages 165-168

The Walk

7min
pages 173-176

A Funeral Sestina

1min
pages 163-164

How to Solve a Rubik’s Cube

1min
pages 169-170

Fault Lines

5min
pages 160-162

Dinner Conversation

7min
pages 152-158

Manifest Palimpsest

0
page 159

By The Numbers

7min
pages 145-149

Miracle of Wood

0
pages 150-151

Child’s Moon

7min
pages 136-139

Three Days in Houston

5min
pages 142-144

Because of Mount St. Helens

1min
pages 132-135

Lark Ascending

7min
pages 127-131

Embrace Embarassment

1min
pages 121-126

Invisible Tigers

4min
pages 119-120

Octopus Heart

0
page 116

Beauty Shop

1min
pages 117-118

Fetal Position

6min
pages 112-115

Bullighter

7min
pages 107-110

Sound of Bees

4min
pages 97-99

Descend

1min
pages 100-101

The Journey of a Magnum Opus

2min
pages 94-95

Parosmia

1min
page 96

My Pronoun

0
page 88

Dear Marcie

7min
pages 89-93

First Frost

0
page 83

Seasons Change

7min
pages 84-87

ABCs for My 1, 2, 3

7min
pages 79-82

The Rapture and The Rupture

7min
pages 72-78

Breach

0
page 63

Compromise

7min
pages 57-60

A Man Named Joe

3min
pages 69-70

it is natural

0
page 71

Ruptured

7min
pages 64-68

No Ruptured Skull Today

3min
pages 61-62

My Mother’s Rolls

4min
pages 54-56

After the Sample

4min
pages 32-34

Shattering the Illusion of Control

7min
pages 45-52

Repairs Under Pressure

7min
pages 27-30

Rupture Stone

1min
pages 37-39

The Flood

3min
pages 35-36

Uninvited

7min
pages 40-44

My Brother

0
page 31

Introduction

5min
pages 19-26
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