I smoked what was left of my pipe and tidied my house. I thought about how alone I would look if a camera was hidden. I folded a few months of laundry and spackled the drawers. I gathered the cobwebs and laid them onto a plate one strand at a time. I imagined a hammock’s day in the mild sun. I twisted the clock to display a time I preferred. I brushed the green-gray scum off the tap that’s been dripping onto the dishes. I wetted the five clay pots that play host to my flowers. I padded the warps in the hardwood in the living room. In the distance, a slammed garage went off like a bomb. I raised my voice to the rodents I keep on the mantle. Felt remorse. Scheduled the next 10 years of dental appointments for me and my dad. Rented the last few films that the master directed before he died. Painted my nails bright black and went out with a leash and no dog. I spoke to the big white oyster that hangs from the sky. I melted a slice of cheese on toast and called that a dinner. I posed a question to my water glass. I believed it would answer.   ✦   I smoked what was left of my pipe and tidied my house. I thought about how alone I would look if a camera was hidden. I folded a few months of laundry and spackled the drawers. I gathered the cobwebs and laid them onto a plate one strand at a time. I imagined a hammock’s day in the mild sun. I twisted the clock to display a time I preferred. I brushed the green-gray scum off the tap that’s been dripping onto the dishes. I wetted the five clay pots that play host to my flowers. I padded the warps in the hardwood in the living room. In the distance, a slammed garage went off like a bomb. I raised my voice to the rodents I keep on the mantle. Felt remorse. Scheduled the next 10 years of dental appointments for me and my dad. Rented the last few films that the master directed before he died. Painted my nails bright black and went out with a leash and no dog. I spoke to the big white oyster that hangs from the sky. I melted a slice of cheese on toast and called that a dinner. I posed a question to my water glass. I believed it would answer.   ✦   

I’m a writer, cartoonist, translator, and teacher based in New York.

You can find my poetry in the New England Review, Image, Bennington Review, and elsewhere. I hold an MFA in creative writing from the University of Iowa.

My cartoons and comics appear in the New Yorker, Narrative, Air Mail, Reader’s Digest, as a weekly feature in the Sunday Long Read, and as part of an exhibition at the Jewish Museum of Maryland.

I am also a translator. My translation of Judith Herzberg’s chapbook Landscape (Dutch) was published by Circumference Books (2022). I was a finalist for the Peirene Stevns Translation Prize 2024. I hold an MFA in literary translation from the University of Iowa, and am an official translator recognized by the Dutch Foundation for Literature.

I have been a fellow at Fulbright, New Jewish Culture Fellowship, UNESCO, and PJ Libraries and have worked as a linguist at Khan Academy, Google, and elsewhere.

© Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   © Jake Goldwasser 2026   ✦   

Set in BhuTuka Expanded One by Erin McLaughlin, a Gurmukhi companion to BioRhyme Expanded by Aoife Mooney, and Inter by Rasmus Andersson.