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!

Tuesday, February 1, 2022

Rain Prayer

 

February 1, 1975  (I was 30)

 

Rain Prayer

The rain.

What will wash

away as I walk?

May it be

wind blown drapes

drafting the full room

in natural respiration.

Rain

batter my face

cleanse my vision

blur the daily illusions.

Rain strengthen

my cautious steps

on the running mud.

Put wisdom in my feet.

Rain be my wetskin

protection from the cold.

Be all the benevolent metaphors

attached to my sanity.

Rain

longer than ritual

beyond rebirth and baptism

yet short of retribution.

Let lightning be

fashioned upon my tongue.

 

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