VQR Online

My name is Jane Schreiber; five evenings a week I sit behind the reference desk in a west side branch of the public library and answer readers’ questions. These are mainly about the location of the public facilities. We keep both locked. 

In March of 1970 Senator Roman Hruska, Republican of Nebraska, supported the nomination of Judge Carswell to the Supreme Court by commenting: “Even if he were mediocre, there are lots of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are...

It’s a routine we’ve worked out
to pass the winter.
I saw myself in two, in three,
into a puzzle,

How I hate you tonight!
I tick off
the bumps on your back,
your hangnails, the acid

I watch the point of the twirling stick
Where you are sleeping, where you will come again.

In every sale a list of ways your home 
could be destroyed: flood, poison, earthquake, fire. 

Behold the marvel of the animal’s fabrication.

This early, the small birds’ trudging notes;
Six storeys high, a crane looms
As in graceful blessing…