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, March 6, 2018

Lady Lazarus


March 6, 1972  (I was 27)

Lady Lazarus
now you have winked your word in stone
What was it you wanted
Wasn’t it in the cadaver room
you first learned it did not matter

Oh you methodically raked
the ashes of Hitler’s Jews
but for you it was through before that
through when the first lipless smile
turned to say hello
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