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!

Friday, July 1, 2022

Turn of the phrase is not done on a lathe

 

July 1, 2011 (I was 66)

 

Turn of the phrase is not done on a lathe

not wheeled and peeled into curls

not furrowed and beveled and burnished

always a bit smaller than first uttered

 

More like the looped string game

I grasp the line within your fingers

stretch and expand what you hand me

to another contortion supported geometrically

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