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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Friday, July 3, 2020

Yang and Yin

from this week in July, 1970 (I was 25)

 

         Yang and Yin

I’ve crept before along the ocean shore

and wondered there across its sloping floor.

Many a time I swore its pulsing brine and blood

of mine were one, union of mother and son.

Yet, that notion is an earthly bond of elements,

and deeper than its deepest reach

thoughts breach like discontented spirits

who grope toward steeper slopes, like bubbles

bounding from sunken fountains, ever whispering

“up the mountains, up the mountains.”

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