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!

Wednesday, July 17, 2019

Family Music


July 17, 2009  (I was 64)

         Family Music
Once there was music
a pair of clarinets
in thin harmony and fragile strength
like hope and sunrise
bird call and answer

Once were molten golden notes
poured from bell of saxophone
pure liquid substance
permeated every room
like warmth and light
hits everyone around a fire

Once a complexity of melody
a galaxy of constellations
sparkled from a flute
to fill the density of heaven
like a continuity of wisdoms
that hold our myths together

Once there was music
made by those who could
Now only the percussive hammering
of one who could never hold a beat
An occasional lost echo
haunts a different reality
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