Poetry & Prose
Fostering Kittens
After 10 kittens in the last 12 months, now you, number 11 another whiskered wanderer, a black white furry guest, little monk with no need to possess, little monk with no need to confess. Playful innocence with a skinny tail. We teach you house manners: the litter...
The Future
The future is walking toward your house. The future is standing on your porch. The future is ringing your doorbell. The future is not waiting to be let in. The future is breaking down your door. The future is throwing a fit in your house, warming your beer, turning...
The Shadow Side of “Love Me”
‘Love me.’ Make me compulsory in your life. Feel hollow when I am absent, ache when I am angry with you. Care enough to get angry with me. Show concern with my suit and tie when I leave the house in the morning. May fear grip you when I am sick and anxiety when I am...
Say What?
The words you refuse to say are the words you refuse to hear. 2.Think of the things you ought not say. Are they things that need to be heard? 3.Do you dare say to yourself what you want to say to me? 4.In your speaking throughout today, do not add to the mush of...
Answers & Questions
What are the questions we have stopped asking? What are the answers we have stopped questioning? When you come upon a satisfying answer, disturb it with a different kind of question.
The Past
The past is most dangerous when it is not left in the past, when the past is revered in the present as a fantasy fitting for the future, when the past is a bad memory mistaken for a hopeful plan.
Destiny
The check-out girl at the grocery store was named Destiny, according to her tag. And I wondered what her destiny might be. And I wondered if she wondered. Some predestined plan? A trip-tik plotted out with detours and delays for her drive through decades toward the...
A Riff on My Neighborhood
There are no songs in my neighborhood. No curbside singers. No front stoop strummers. No back porch drummers. No rhymes or rhythms rising out of cracks in the sidewalk like lyrical weeds. No guy down the street with bongos serenading the moon or the same guy with...
A Lotus-Eater in Paradise
I do not want to go to Hawaii. Always have not wanted to go. Too dangerous. Too much sunshine. Too many pineapples. Too much sugar cane. Swaying grass hips. Sweetness and light. Too much white silky sand. Too many waves massaging the beach. The urge would be to lie...
Morning Watch
These days I don’t do much. I like not doing much. It gives me something to do. In the early morning I sit and wait. Not waiting, exactly. Not like waiting for Christmas, waiting for the cable guy, or waiting for the 6 o’clock news. More like watching. Like keeping an...