Poetry & Prose

Human Ages in Stages

We name the stages of our very human ages: Epochs. Eras. Periods. Phases. ਯੁੱਗ. The Stone Age. The Iron Age. The Ice Age. The Dark Ages. The Age of Enlightenment. The Middle Ages. How did they know? To locate time in the middle, you have to know two things: the...

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The Yellow Light

Yesterday, while driving, the car behind me honked. My offense: I stopped at a yellow light. I could have gone through, glimpsing up at the glimmer of red as I shot past the intersection on my way down the road. Chances are I would have safely made it, and the tailing...

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Untimely Eulogy

My 50 year-old friends are impolite. They discuss my life within earshot, as if I wasn’t there. Sooner or later, I won’t be. I'm happy to hear them rehearse my biography. I listen, a eulogy of sorts, the good, the bad, the ugly, characteristics, habits, hobbies,...

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The Brother Returns

You cannot be at home until you leave and return, having experienced the difference between away and back, You did not miss what the house lacked until the celebration of your homecoming when you felt the burden of what wasn't there.   . The eagle goes a long way off...

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Repair

"Tikun Olam"* The house is falling down. Let's paint the walls. There are termites in the attic which explains water in the basement. The hinges on all doors are frozen halfway. Some think frozen open. Some think frozen shut. Let us redecorate with pictures of sound...

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Conveniently Inconveniently

Being dead is a huge inconvenience for everyone but the dead. Family, both miles-away-people and close-ups under the roof, experience a variety of griefs and unsettled grievances. Verbs decay from active to passive, tenses shift from present to past, pronouns from you...

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Readjustment

That’s what the steering wheel is for, amending the car/road relationship. The road is constant. The car is not. Weaving, veering, drifting, etc. For example, the car too close to the yellow line, or attempting a left-hand  turn in traffic, or on a trip to the grocery...

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The Whispers

we are receivers                  receivers          all receivers satellites (envying stars)  zing through                atmospheric                       windows      distant  scenes battering                                              eyes ideational sounds...

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The Vantage Point of Age

I live downstream from what I have made of my life. In the repose of age, I sit by the stream of memory and watch all that I have saved of my original self and all that I have lost of my original self float by.

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