No News Today - Guest Post - Laure-Anne Bosselaar

Her long nails click on the keyboard.  He goes for a beer.  Rain or sleet in the streets, depending, and not one church bell ringing, not one.  And that for weeks.

Her story spins but she keeps the clicking going and six beers later darkness enters the room.  He does too, but the clicking keeps him from putting his hand on her neck, keeps him from speaking.  Her story begs for a response.

The tape-recorder in the steeple broke.  It can't play its ringing church bells, so the reel spins madly, up there, day and night: Slip-slip-slip. Slip-slip-slip.

People come out of their houses.  Did you expect that sleet they say.  It's rain, some answer.  What about the bells, they ask.  Let them be, some say.

She keeps on typing.  It's essential, you understand.  Her nails shorten. The clicking dims.  She hears him say I'm going for a beer.  Story of my life, she clicks.

Laure-Anne Bosselaar is the author of three collections of poetry, most recently, A New Hunger, published by Ausable Press. She has taught at several colleges and universities, including Sarah Lawrence College and the Solstice Low-Residency MFA program at Pine Manor College.