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.


Comments Welcome!

Friday, May 18, 2018

I’ve played in the realms of altered perceptions


From this week in May, 2017 (I was 72)

I’ve played in the realms of altered perceptions
most of the years of my life
crossing the seams of seems to escape
until I no longer need radical means
There are many internal avenues of departure
obvious and subtle and easily ignored
by our fascination with the exotic
when every room is a different library
and every scene a new environ to inhabit
In mechanical sense when the equipment differs
an altered product is produced
Minor movement changes point of view
Reaching an age where shadow monkeys shared
might raise suspicion of diminished capacities
rather than a vision of all that’s there

No comments:

Post a Comment