This selection, chosen by guest editor Joey Gould, is from How to Play by Katie Manning (Louisiana Literature Press 2022).
Scrabble with E.B. White
His mustache still
surprised me.
I’d assumed as a child that E
was for Emily, but I smiled
and pushed seven tiles his way.
He’d been dead for thirty years,
but I’ll play Scrabble with anyone.
Runt. Ax. Child.
Loving. Win. Web.
Our words were haunted.
I first read Charlotte’s Web
when I was nine, I said.
I still love it. Do you enjoy it too?
Yes, it’s a great story, he said,
brow furrowed. Would you remind me
who wrote it?
Katie Manning is the founding editor of Whale Road Review and a professor of writing at Point Loma Nazarene University. Winner of the Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award for Tasty Other, she’s the author of eight poetry collections, most recently Hereverent (Agape Editions, 2023) and How to Play (Louisiana Literature Press, 2022). Her writing has been featured on Poetry Unbound, Tangle News, Verse Daily, and many other venues. 
Joey Gould, who is Sundress Academy for the Arts Spring 2024 Writer in Residence, wrote The Acute Avian Heart (2019, Lily Poetry Review) & Penitent>Arbiter (2022, Lily Poetry Review), while their recent work has appeared or is forthcoming in Meow Meow Pow Pow, Miniskirt Magazine, & Persephone’s Fruit. They also serve as Poetry Editor for Drunk Monkeys.
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