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 3, 2019

How temporary must be


May 3, 1975 (I was 30)

How temporary must be
this task to overfill a rented house
with children who will not wait
for us to afford their home.
We exist in misshapen dreams
of what we know we really are.
And it happens every day;
though there may be reasons
I can't offer any excuses.
Didn't we have a dogma?
I find me on a fugitive poster,
paralysis and blindness the crimes.
We didn't know the price on our own heads.
We've been such elusive runners, 
how can it be that we are guilty?

No comments:

Post a Comment