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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Wednesday, January 6, 2021

Wherever I have been I’m not quite there

 

January 6, 2013  (I was 68)

 

Wherever I have been I’m not quite there

there is always the place I just left

and the one I never get to

I’ve been detained in the woods

and lost in a cloud regretted the dreams

with accompanying schemes spoken aloud

When I look at them I’m among the stars

Out of sight in the daylight I find they’re out of mind

The more now to be done the less I can do

Satisfaction has no expectations it is

the now to be lost in the now to be

repeating the unlearned from my history

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