Richard Rauch
Hands clasped,
fingers interlaced
for just a moment
before touching
lightly at the wrist.
Palms, too sweaty
to grasp the gravity
of the situation,
lose their grip.
A stray finger
hooks another,
lingering
for just a second
before slipping away.
Born and raised in the New Orleans area, Richard lives along Bayou Lacombe in southeast Louisiana. A graduate of LSU, he received his doctorate in theoretical physics from Stony Brook University. He has lived and worked in New York, Los Angeles, Washington DC, and currently tests rockets at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. Richard’s poetry credits include Big Muddy, Bindweed Magazine, Brushfire Literature and Arts Journal, The Cape Rock, Confrontation, Crack the Spine, decomP, Edison Literary Review, El Portal, Euphony, Evening Street Review, Grey Sparrow, Neologism Poetry Journal,The Oxford American, Pembroke Magazine, Pennsylvania English, The Phoenix, Plainsongs, Quiddity, Sheila-Na-Gig Online, SLAB, Steam Ticket, Whimperbang, Wild Violet, the Love Notes anthology (Vagabondage Press), and Down to the Dark River: An Anthology of Contemporary Poems about the Mississippi River (Louisiana Literature Press). His flash fiction credits include Infective Ink and Aspen Idea (2012 Aspen Writers’ Foundation/Esquire Short, Short Fiction Contest finalist).