by Warren Gaston | Dec 26, 2022
Standing in an aisle of fruits and vegetables, past sacks of flour and rows of canned beans, bread loafs sheathed in plastic, potatoes and corn bagged in edible disguises, glistening pink salmon, scintillating trout, gray piled clams, blood red beef, pale pork, a...
by Warren Gaston | Dec 22, 2022
On this particular day, I did what I do on other particular days, got up, washed up, ate up, cleaned up, hurried up, went downtown, sat down, got down to work, hunkered down, at the watercooler I was put down, felt let down I slowed down, left downtown, came home,...
by Warren Gaston | Dec 5, 2022
Associative progression: A milkweed pod, a brown-eyed cow, the milky way.
by Warren Gaston | Nov 30, 2022
No actors. No bird songs, no squirrels, no lumbering groundhogs, no deer eyes soft among trees. Only things acted upon, rustling leaves, water dripping from a downspout, a shadow moving with the sun. The scene was fauna free. Then a house fly landed on my ankle,...
by Warren Gaston | Nov 28, 2022
I look for you. I know you are dead but I look for you. An irrational act, but I look for you. Not in a city taking up space, you’ve timed out of space, but in a peripheral time, the suburb of memory where dead friends live. I remember them, at least try to, I offer...
by Warren Gaston | Nov 23, 2022
Driving across a bridge, so much trust; unseen trusses, reasonable confidence, faith sufficient to take a risk, a chronicle of unfaltering achievement, or a night road, headlights coming no fear as you both steer clear, or when you want news to be true, without...
by Warren Gaston | Nov 18, 2022
There are things I know. There are things I don’t know. There are things I know I don’t know. There are things I don’t know I don’t know. Then there are things I can’t know. Those are fundamental things, the bedrock of all knowing. You can’t know them either. That is...
by Warren Gaston | Nov 17, 2022
I have no need to be great. A solid good is fine. I’m wary of very best. Superlatives make me dizzy, especially self-imposed superlatives. When asked who I am, I reply, I am the self I am getting over. Getting over yourself is a big...
by Warren Gaston | Nov 15, 2022
“Poetry is a way of holding experience, not holding on to, but holding.” Anne Michaels Canadian Poet Something was over. The war, I was told. People were happy. I was two. Whatever war was, it was good it was over. I was right to be happy. We all were. Our side won....
by Warren Gaston | Nov 12, 2022
The clerk called me “Sweetheart” as I paid my bill and checked out of the grocery store line. In reply, I apologized for my poor memory. “I’m sorry, our affections were so long ago I do not remember our trysts or your name.” Actually, I said, “Have a nice day,” cliché...
