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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Sunday, June 25, 2017

We can easily imagine because we’ve seen


from this week in June 2013  (I was 68)

We can easily imagine because we’ve seen
the film running backwards
The diver emerging from the pool
to somersault upward and delicately
landing on the tip of the springboard
The full bloom rose withdrawing to bud
A poker dealer plucks cards out of the air
to snap them back on top of the deck
Though as readily available on the reel
we don’t do as well to mentally picture
the baby restuffed into the womb
feet first

And how many redirected images
swarming ants feet doing a jitterbug
breathing the pianist the drummer
in fact the whole damn orchestra
even orbiting planets and drifting stars
congressional speakers
seem not to change at all
no matter how we run the film through the projector
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