| Laura LeHew |
A Word Problemread by laura lehew Four daughters race around me in opposite directions, at a constant rate. They start at the same point and meet every 30 seconds. If they move in the same direction, they meet every 120 seconds. They stay in St. Luke’s seven thousand two hundred minutes; approximately long enough for closure. If a standard vinyl covered innerspring mattress for a Hospital Bed is a 36” x 80,” what is on the mind of each daughter? Hints: 1) Let w = the rate of daughter 1 Let x = the rate of daughter 2 Let y = the rate of daughter 3 Let z = the rate of daughter 4 Let a = the rate of the missing son 2) Use substitution or elimination Answer (round each answer individually): Solve for daughter 1: (1)?(2) Divert unwanted questions, attempt conversion Solve for daughter 2: (2)?(3) Substitute for a thinner daughter Solve for daughter 3: (3)?(4) Substitute for a smarter daughter Solve for daughter 4: (4)?(a) Substitute for chicken fingers and a loaf of bread Solve for missing son: (a)?(1) Substitute for a new family (see daughters x, y, and z) I am in a hospital headed toward home hospice. Its route is circular.  © Albina Terentjeva Things That Are Difficult To Sayread by laura lehew this is how it starts one little thing at a time a pattern to be seen imagine paper ink syntax as stones I made misery sing modify history dig trenches straying from the safety of words promises made in the heat tongues betray tangle with leaves and twigs no attractable phenomena— whatever happened to commitment it’s kind of an obvious question there are other ways to hear each perfect in its mutilation the voice of god a sour note of sorrow scalpels as if the funeral was late I am waiting between light and no light how beautiful the grave a vacation that never ends the glass the shining dead air an immolation of witches learn what desolation is refuse to be silent the present vanishes silence and speech the scar that never heals all wolves and worse just east of yesterday waiting to be born again as if it were a certainty I see the patterns on glass mirrors on every wall my face comes apart in ripples startled into Asphodel blood on the tongue and death before it the dark half-revealed I am the last to leave unlike the tattoo of you I may forgive whatever this is I know what I do not see I turn to speak and the world is empty falling through an avalanche |