MENU

Sections

  • Home
  • About
    • Contact Us
    • Editors and Writers
    • Join our Mailing List
    • Letters to Editor Policy
    • Advertising & Underwriting
    • Code of Ethics
    • Privacy
    • Talbot Spy Terms of Use
  • Art and Design
  • Culture and Local Life
  • Public Affairs
    • Ecosystem
    • Education
    • Health
    • Senior Life
  • Community Opinion
  • Sign up for Free Subscription
  • Donate to the Talbot Spy
  • Cambridge Spy

More

  • Support the Spy
  • About Spy Community Media
  • Advertising with the Spy
  • Subscribe
May 17, 2025

Talbot Spy

Nonpartisan Education-based News for Talbot County Community

  • Home
  • About
    • Contact Us
    • Editors and Writers
    • Join our Mailing List
    • Letters to Editor Policy
    • Advertising & Underwriting
    • Code of Ethics
    • Privacy
    • Talbot Spy Terms of Use
  • Art and Design
  • Culture and Local Life
  • Public Affairs
    • Ecosystem
    • Education
    • Health
    • Senior Life
  • Community Opinion
  • Sign up for Free Subscription
  • Donate to the Talbot Spy
  • Cambridge Spy
3 Top Story Arts Delmarva Review

Delmarva Review: “When/Then/That” by Katherine Gekker

May 22, 2021 by Delmarva Review

Share

Author’s Note: “When a significant relationship ends painfully, we often find ourselves rehashing the turning points, the decisions, the regrets. With the repetition of “when, then, that,” I hope to create an unsettling and even ominous litany that will evoke the human tendency to torture ourselves with unwelcome memories and afterthoughts.”

When/Then/That

That time I saw you on Bramble Causeway, and then we married
That time I realized how much you drank every day
That time I told you your new blue blazer looked cheap
Then that time the dog and I almost stepped on a copperhead
That time you yelled that awful word at me
That day I moved out
                                    when we held onto each other on the stairs
That time a garter snake slipped past the dog and me
That time you had a gun
Then that unbearable time
           when the dog and I still smelled your cigarette smoke everywhere
That time I pretended I had a gun
         then walked into the woods
               without the dog
⧫

“When/Then/That” was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Katherine Gekker was recently named Assistant Poetry Editor of the Delmarva Review. She is the author of “In Search of Warm Breathing Things” (Glass Lyre Press, 2019). Her poems have been published in Delmarva Review, Little Patuxent Review, Broadkill Review, Poetry South, and Apple Valley Review. Her work has also been nominated for Best of the Net. Her poems, collectively called “…to Cast a Shadow Again,” have been set to music by composer Eric Ewazen. Composer Carson Cooman has set a seasonal cycle of her poems, “Chasing the Moon Down,” to music. Website: KatherineGekker.com. 

Delmarva Review publishes the best of new prose and poetry selected from thousands of submissions annually. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, it receives partial financial support from individual contributions and a grant from the Talbot County Arts Council with funds from the Maryland State Arts Council. The review is available worldwide in paperback and electronic editions from Amazon.com and other major online booksellers and specialty regional bookstores. Website: DelmarvaReview.org.  

#  #  #

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Filed Under: 3 Top Story, Delmarva Review

Chesapeake Lens: “Capricorn One” by David Sites Washington College Awards Largest Undergraduate Literary Prize to Justin Thomas Nash

Letters to Editor

  1. Irene Fick says

    May 24, 2021 at 9:14 AM

    This is so lovely and so poignant. A gorgeous poem!

Write a Letter to the Editor on this Article

We encourage readers to offer their point of view on this article by submitting the following form. Editing is sometimes necessary and is done at the discretion of the editorial staff.

Copyright © 2025

Affiliated News

  • The Chestertown Spy
  • The Talbot Spy

Sections

  • Arts
  • Culture
  • Ecosystem
  • Education
  • Mid-Shore Health
  • Culture and Local Life
  • Shore Recovery
  • Spy Senior Nation

Spy Community Media

  • Subscribe
  • Contact Us
  • Advertising & Underwriting

Copyright © 2025 · Spy Community Media Child Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in