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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Saturday, September 11, 2021

septememoriam

 

September 11, 2006  (I was 61)

 

         septememoriam

National mourning is precisely ritualistic

Those in public employ practice eulogy

The tone is refined the voice restrained

yet resolute  Their demeanor is somber

Beyond the honesty of empathy

they are personally involved

the official voice of sincerity

the declaration of determination

the assurance that none were lost in vain

In sacrifice we find strength

to endure and the will to move on

Years later the immediate survivors

test the flexibility of scar tissue

as they work to reform mis-shapen lives

and clear a path a day through wilderness

no nation has learned to tame

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