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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Tuesday, October 17, 2017

I walk the invisible dog in the park


October 17, 2013  (I was 68)

I walk the invisible dog in the park
It follows without a leash
Sometimes other people’s dogs
half know the invisible dog is there
There is no canine confrontation
My attention is invisibly occupied
Other dogs chase squirrels they can see
The invisible dog chases nothing
I do not know where it sleeps  I do not feed it
It does not arrive in the car with me
Many dog walkers bag the defecations
Many of us do not  I go unnoticed
I don’t know what kind of shit the invisible dog leaves behind
It is not my intention to walk the dog
I am here for the exercise the light the serenity
which I achieve only in moments the dog minds itself
Most of the time it trots alongside
close enough for me to count its breaths
It is not in the car when I drive to the rest of my day
The distant wail diminishes but does not cease
I’d like the invisible dog to successfully run away
Whatever path I walk I remain a familiar scent
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