I used to create a miniature horse, just using the power of my thoughts. I performed the trick only when we had guests over, when the children were peeking through the stairs at our friends pouring highballs in the kitchen. After a few whiskeys, I’d call everyone over, and I’d conjure the miniature horse, which they all marveled at, the wild hair of its mane, the magnificent muscles in its forelegs. And every time I conjured the horse I thought about my drinking, about the way my hands got shakier each time I performed the trick, how the horse ran in narrower and narrower circles on the furrows on my hand. Until finally, the circle was so small that the horse disappeared. Late at night, the moon white in the trees, I lie awake, not thinking of my ex-wife or the children with whom I rarely speak. Instead, when the shaking starts, I think of the way that horse used to run at those parties, wild and free, as sunlight through a grove of winter bare trees.
