I miss Ethiopian food. I miss Maurice Manning singing Tecumseh Valley into the thickest Alabama night-air. I miss the sky's color earlier when it was all kinds of purpley-blue. I miss fresh figs & fireworks & homemade marshmallows & a big silver cat I loved so much and a big cowboy tomcat I also loved. I miss Riverside Drive and all of its various warmths. I already miss Middleton Avenue and the outdoor grilling that hasn't even happened yet this season but will pass quickly into a new life and one that the New Life Red Rover Kids keep calling me out to but I'm just not yet ready to shake this chain of hands and run forward, let alone fly through. I miss last fall and the one before and that big snowfall three weeks ago. I miss too much.

Virág
Like a name like

flower. Like a

country like the

sound of a state.

Once we drove

in a small car

through a field of

tulips so red so

red the sky had

to leave. The sky

was not itself and

all that was left

was gray so gray

that red could

seem more red

than anything. That

day so many cars

stopped, people

ran into the

field and made

intonations to the

tulips. It was

February. A good

month for tulips.

In a small country

with a view of

the ocean.

**
Amanda Nadelberg's