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, January 27, 2021

By now I have seen many

 

January27, 2013  (I was 68)

 

By now I have seen many

that wore their honors out

runners whom renown outran

They newspaper the past

of many an older man

When I first read of Houseman’s dead

I inscribed my volume in dedication

to the demise of that year’s youth

nodding my head to A.E.’s truth

After fifty years it seems not smart to slip away

much smarter not to play

Athletic scandal is a national pastime

Better it is to own the Grecian urn

depicting the laurels Ernie Davis earned

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