Gregory Howard’s work has appeared in The Collagist, Harp & Altar, Birkensnake, and Tarpaulin Sky, among other journals. He teaches at the University of Maine.
We were picnicking on the plains when she emerged from the rushes. She wore an apricot smock. Her face was smeared with soot. She said her name was Stina Groth. A cloud of bats burst from the chimney of a crumbling cottage behind her. We asked her where home was. She drew a circle in the silt with a twig.
With floret centers so prolific they turn—furred caterpillar folds? zipped mouths? burn marks?— the quite contrary daisy faces grow dense in Mary’s garden.
He was in the garage of an old house, riding one of those toy horses held to a metal frame by springs. It was not very fast, not very curious about the horizon.