Travel with me — to places unknown — on a path of words and imagination.

Zoe, the Happy Hunter

The day is full of delightful smells.  Old leaves rotting beneath layers of snow melt and the warm whiff of morning air that blows across the pine needle duff under the sun. I plunge my snoot into the brush again and again, inhaling the delectable aperitif in short, swift snorts. But the best scents are those pungent ones…

The Gunj: A Year in India

The Gunj India Rickshaw

The Gunj – a strange and unlikely name for a burst of personal freedom and an afternoon of culinary delight. Nineteen years old, I had traveled halfway around the world to study at a girls’ college in India, only to find my freedom curtailed by strict institutional and cultural rules. was a local shopping center in Lucknow that female students were allowed to frequent without chaperons…

Hill Tribe Mom

I still have the photo from Phu Koc,
you and your baby barefoot
at the village snack shop.
I never knew your name.

He is so precious, tiny
little man in Hello Kitty
pajamas, standing like
a conquering warrior in
miniature Ahka headdress,
its fine, colorful stitches
you spent careful weeks sewing.

I still have the picture of you
kneeling…