TO GATHER Penland Glassblowing Studio, May 2018 First, gather myself, let the fears and distractions fall away, so when my hands touch the rod, all I feel is steel. Check the glow of the heated end. Steps to the furnace are sure and relaxed. Brief smile and eye contact with my door buddy, then square […]
No hourglass, more like a windswept dune, blazing sun and footing that shifts just before I step. Seemed solid, now I fall, again, and look back at the hollow traces of my scrambling, as if to read my mistake, to learn something, anything, from these bruises. Heat shimmers at the horizon tempt me to change […]
25 years ago today, I woke up at the beautiful Asilomar Center on Monterey peninsula, sat up in bed and wondered if I had a birthday poem in me. This mindset was inspired by a man at the conference named Roy Jordan, who enthusiastically recited his poems at any moment, especially in the dining hall. […]
This school never closes though students can be dismissed any time they can never go home again and again they try to master today’s lesson for totally ingrained is the grief for today as it fades and the fear of what the new teacher, tomorrow, will require of us
Blood, rubble, hate, outrage what hysterical god made forgiveness and reconciliation so difficult? It appears we can never walk together our words congeal and dissolve on the screen of I blame assigned as precisely as a misguided missile as carefully as a spent cartridge on concrete. Miles and years away we both thresh pain seeking […]
Hot beignet drops from shaking hand, phosphorescent meteor of confectioners sugar scatters sweetness to a silent Jackson Square. The plump fried pastry sparks to life upon splashdown in a Mississippi colored puddle, succulent ripples breach the curb, strut down the sidewalk, lap on doors, then leap to the humid air, to penetrate every lacy wrought […]
a twitch of a finger speeds hot lead through skin and bone to burst a heart life oozing to gray the equalizer the peacemaker easy executioner no judge no jury the burning ricochet cuts us all down mockeries of truth of brotherhood what might have been no fear no corpse no twitch
Consider July a smelling salt to rouse your faint year from sleepwalking, startled nostrils finally snort in this year’s bouquet. Ponder the steam of August melting towards September, yellow school bus dinosaurs prowl the morning roads to ingest reluctant morsels, cool shoes and backpacks the last whiff of freedom down institutional hallways. Daydream out windows […]
Morning rung to attention by distant train horn beckoning me like an iron bell to a churchgoer. Ears pass the call inside, stomach rumbles for new roads, nose hungry for scraping steel. My feet’s rhythm quickens, the louder tones now clear – five penetrating notes stacked up in extravagant harmony, complete yet open, pleasing […]
My mother at home in Nanticoke, Pennsylvania Dust of the coal mines on the window sill lightened to gray by a gentle snow, our simple clapboard house also freshened from within by the exotic smell of oranges, a seeming miracle delivered only at the holidays from some far off land, an extravagant purchase that […]