Stafford Challenge. 09/20/2026

 When we were cleaning out

the last three storage units full

of mother’s hoard

 

I took a standing jewelry box to contain

the last 39 of 400 necklaces I beaded—

a year-long memorial duplicating

an obsessive-compulsive disorder

I was grateful to have not inherited from my father

 

and my mother’s childhood doll

tucked away for decades

in a metal trunk alongside hand-carved

doll house furniture we were never allowed to play with.

 

I have no memory of the doll,

don’t understand its story or significance,

only know that she preserved it for over seventy years

 

preserved with her wedding shoes

and home sewn dress,

one yearbook, a graduation certificate,

things she considered important

were guarded.

 

It sits half-fallen over,

the doll face peeling and faded

hair painted on, one arm broken

 

placed on a shelf with my poppets—

dolls made for spells—and hat pins,

things meant to be handled, mulled-over, mauled

pierced

 

and if mother had a mobile spirit

I imagine she’d ask

“why don’t you treat it with love?”

Stafford Challenge. 09/19/2026

 

After dinner, Mother pulled kitchen chairs

to the sink so one sister could wash dishes

and the other rinse and dry.

 

When it was my turn to dry I wrapped

one arm around and pulled the serving bowls

into my belly, like clutching a resistant cat.

I ran dishtowels around at least three times,

the dishes still wet.

Dinnerware was slippery in our tiny hands.

 

It’s not that we never dropped a fork

or a plate, but melamine was durable,

and cheap. It was for family use.

 

After we all moved out,

Mother replaced it

with mass-produced pottery,

the melamine stored downstairs

in a cupboard next to cups

with the face of Saint Nicholas.

Stafford Challenge. 09/18/2026

 1964 – 1969. Saturdays.

 

Mother was home, scrubbing—

a linoleum floor, a toilet, tub, two sinks—

wash clothes folded under her knees for pads,

the same Patsy Cline record on repeat.

 

Daddy drove us three kids to QFC

where he purchased a bag of cracker jacks,

sometimes black vines,

and cashed a check for five dollars.

He dropped us out in front of the Bay Theater.

Laura and I holding hands while Jimmy

got the tickets. With five dollars

there was a handful of change

and Jimmy got to keep it.

 

Two hours in a theater full of squirming.

When the film lit the room

I looked down the row to see how many others

were temporarily orphaned.

 

Then Daddy waiting out front; in a car that smelled

of stale beer and cigars, pop songs playing

in the background.  

 

Nothing about these memories is rancid.

Stafford Challenge. 09/17/2026

 

Show me something that changes everything.

Not a podcast, but an uninterrupted beat

that obliterates cortisol.

Not a tuning fork struck before bed,

but an even higher-level vibration,

I might activate with a pinch

or a pill. An implant that removes anxiety.

Show me how to rise refreshed.

How to cultivate compassion.

A technology for becoming a better human.

A confirmation bias that builds trust.

Stafford Challenge: 09/16/2026

 I am awake because I have to be awake.

My skillset is still required. I am still employed.

 

A car alarm is screaming that a car was touched.

The plagues have abated, for now, but will be back shortly,

to resume shaping history—some military victory

or new savior hanging frustrated stage right.

Big Agriculture and Big Pharmaceuticals

are killing so slowly no one notices.

Chicken is still tasty.

Many Americans are remembering 9/11,

the rest are clogging social media

with their own memorials.

We are all drowning in memories.

At least the apocalypse didn’t arrive

and AI has not terminated the population.

 

In the kitchen, coffee is brewing.

I started a load in the dishwasher, carefully placing

the Highball and wine glasses to survive the spray.

The news is off. I don’t need to see who left us yesterday.

A morning anxiety attack never did me any good.

 

I hope you are warm and well-fed food

grown out of your own pesticide-free garden.

I hope you are still asleep, dreaming of childhood.

Stafford Challenge. 09/15/2026

 Prom at the golf club house. What would go on

to be another tribute band. My fiancé flown in

from Texas where he’d moved for college,

after I suggested his best friend as chaperone.

Dress better suited for a church picnic blanket—

red, white check cotton. Everyone else—slinky.

In the photograph his fingers stretched to capacity

more like holding me back than in, wads of tissue

in my fist and purse—always one flu or another,

young enough to dance through it.

I stopped to watch Monica and Julie

climb in through one of the ground floor windows,

 

willowy and woozy.

 

Piss and vinegar.

Full of beans.

Money and cocaine.

Statuesque. Regal.

Effortlessness I’d never have.

 

Monica sauntered over, our first, “hello”.

She reached around, stroked my backside.

Her eyes and face— like a water painting,  

exuberance blurring by a furrowing brow,

her mouth turning down, a tilt. Moving off,

like a cat in a cloud.

A gesture I’d remember for decades more fondly

than my fiancé’s abrasive grip.

Stafford Challenge. 09/14/2026

 1978. Ignoring strep throat for nearly a year

I was diagnosed with gangrene in my tonsils.

Admitted to Saint Cabrini Hospital,

I gave myself over to the surgical care of a doctor

who wore an imperial mustache

and a ducktail beard,

who had hooked me up to a therapeutic inhaler

every office visit for no reason I can think of

and so far, had touched me inappropriately twice.

I submitted to the designs of caring nurses

and prayer from the Missionary Sisters

of the Sacred Heart of Jesus,

I’d gone under anesthesia as a high soprano

and rose as a tenor. My voice

unrecognizable to the few friends I telephoned.

My friend, Colin visited, and I think he glimpsed my butt

peeping out the back of my gown, blankets

kicked off. I was in too much pain to care.

For a solid month I let ice shards melt

down my throat

until I could handle the jars of baby food.

I swore I’d henceforth pay more attention to my health,

but I didn’t. Not finding out I was pregnant

until the fifth month. Stubbed toes infected.

Depression. Fatigue. Something other than myself

holding my attention.

 

 

 

Stafford Challenge. 09/13/2026

In hindsight, what did we have in common?

The early eighties, I was in my Evangelical phase,  

praising or condoning in every sentence,

throwing—not the first, but certainly the second stone.

 

At the jewelry counter Lonnie asked me

to demonstrate how I put on my eye liner.

Was his line thin enough? He wanted

enhancement, not ridicule.

I complimented his technique

though I asked

why a perfectly beautiful male

would wear makeup.

 

Lonnie and I gossiped in Accessories,

visited in Men’s where we discussed

the lack of quality in the raw linen,

sat together for lunch in the breakroom

where I’d lament my conflictions

working retail.

 

A fledgling model, he gave me a photo

from his latest portfolio. Stunning,

and an overt line under his eyes.

 

After work he walked me

to Seafirst Tower where my fiancé worked,

until my fiancé’s rudeness drove Lonnie away.

 

So many overlooked details.

 

Stafford Challenge. 09/12/2026

Morning walk.

Wet boots left near the door,

my coat slung across the shower bar.

I run a towel through my hair.

I no longer miss having to towel off

all 120 pounds of Lab Zeus.

It has been 20 years

since he muzzled-jabbed me awake.

 

The tea kettle isn’t going to whistle.

Instead, there will be a quiet pop.

If anyone else lived here, they would appreciate that

 

almost as much as I do. The quiet.

The lap blanket. The chenille robe. Slippers.

Coffee and another good book,

the news in the background

like an underscore in a parody,

ads for an updated iPhone, smart watches,

and bundled insurance.

Stafford Challenge. 9/11/2026

Brash. Unwanted. Like timpani

next to one’s head during sleep.

I mute the television volume, avert my eyes

until I’m certain the news has moved on.

Today, another day I won’t talk with family or friends.

I have never looked closely enough

at their ranklement, brewing like daily coffee.

Stafford Challenge. 9/10/2026

 4 a.m. again

and I don’t even lift the curtains.

No visible stars, just streetlamps—

one street framed as the world

lined with cars, shadows

in harsh angles,

last night’s leaves on the ground

and sometimes a person

who should be home in bed—

the tension of their presence.