I don’t write in a journal everyday, but I have accumulated many entries over the past 50+ years beginning in 1966. Some items evolved into longer works. Among the leftovers little pieces survived. I thought a collection of these with a piece culled from the same date in a past year would make an interesting yearbook. The consistencies and inconsistencies of mind, skipping back and forth across time, provide varied perspectives. It is difficult to remember the context of the past we’ve lived; we also make suppositions about times that predate ourselves.

The few alterations from original drafts were to improve clarity. The worst of my work is not included. There remains enough mediocrity and immaturity to make me feel humble and you feel smart. There are also moments of accidental insight and incidental humor.

Author Stephen Crane referred to his little pieces as pills…apparently they were small and somewhat hard to swallow, but good for you.


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Thursday, March 9, 2017

When I was young I vaguely thought


from this week in March, 1971  (I was 26)

When I was young I vaguely thought
adults spent much of their time together
uttering old adages or inventing new ones
to advise the wise man and the early bird
or to serve as themes in adolescent anthologies
with their stories of wise men and early birds
or to serve as dialogue for television
with its Robert Young and Ozzie Nelson
Now of course I’m older and I know
hardly anybody does that or is that
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