everyday is another day
the sun rises and sets
the dogs bark at squirrels
fear festers far away
like a fetid pool filled
with dead and dying fish
(February 11, 2026)
Category: despair
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Our two dogs don’t like the cold rain today;
they huddle deeper into the blankets’
warmth still tangled across the bed upstairs.
I watch the neighbor’s small duck flock parade
behind his fence squawking their displeasure
with the world’s cold misappropriations.
Much farther north of here an ice hardens
quickly into a fiery discontent.
The TV weathermen predict winter storms
will settle darkly across the country
with dire warnings of icy roads to come.
We live out our lives in dangerous times:
where we must brave the cold outside to live,
but any warmth, like love, is hard to find.
(January 24, 2026)
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I want to worry
about our dogs
barking randomly
along the back fence
at shadows and leaves
while the occasional squirrel
fusses at them
from the safety of a tree.
Instead wolves roam the streetsfur stiff with dried blood;
and eviscerated prey
muddy the snow,
while neighborhood dogs
howl through the night.
(January 14, 2026)
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terra incognita, terra pericolosa
We run from shadows
to shadow
without explanations.
We are here:
for a moment;to wait,
to watch,
to worry.
Yet, here now,light flows
in shadows
only here.
So, be wary,be warned, and run.
(October, 5, 2025)
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I had a dream/nightmare this morning. I was returning to a teaching job at a high school where I taught English Literature and Composition 14 years ago. The dream began at an English Department meeting where we were being introduced to a newly purchased curriculum that emphasized teaching the students how to spell. The curriculum came with “can’t fail lessons” and lots of pre-made, easy to grade, worksheets. I was arguing against the program, of course. I tried to explain the benefits of teaching reading and writing through a workshop system, of course. No one was listening to me, or the presentation from the district, of course. Instead, the other teachers spent the time complaining about their students and the administration, of course. Richard, my friend, tried to calm me down, but I took it as he was just patronizing me to get me to shut up. The meeting broke up. I wandered the halls looking for my classroom. I realized that no one had shown me where I was supposed to teach. The halls were crowded. It seemed to be lunch, since no one was in any of the classrooms, instead they were milling about in the common areas. Teachers rushed about, overwhelmed. Students gossiped, politely ignoring me as I walked around the building, lost. I never should have come back to teaching, I thought. I should quit now, I thought. But I can’t quit. I need the money: If I quit, I won’t have any income, I thought. I kept walking around the building in a growing panic. I didn’t know where to go. I woke up, as I remembered that I was retired, that I had a pension, that I wasn’t teaching anymore. That I did not have to teach anymore. It was over. It was over.
(September 10, 2025)
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The adage goes
To save for a rainy day,
But the rain doesn’t rain much
Anymore. When it does
I watch the grass, trees,
And flowers left dance,
A hollow ghostly dance.
I look around the circle;
To see ritual filled eyes
momentarily hope. We are
Lost. The moment’s all
That is left. Tomorrow’s
Too late. It rains
For hours. the air cools,
At least ‘til morning.
Nothing’s changed;
All is as it has been. Yet,
The streets dry quickly,
And the earth cracks
Open like an empty kiss
Bestowed upon a corpse
As a last blessing.
(August 22, 2025)
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Two thousand miles away to the East, the Mad King storms about the castle crashing into people and things he doesn’t understand. People are confused, and unsteady, like a boxer on the ropes. A few of the courtiers prefer it this way. They’ve learned what to do, and how to do it: where they can pursue their malevolent obsessions; while at the same time, create vast personal profits at the expense of everyone else in the kingdom. They quickly slither about the castle, staying close to the walls, so that no one pays them that much attention. The Mad King’s daily ravings on the ramparts help them go unnoticed most days. Everyone loves a jester, especially slap-stick. The Mad King provides the chaos, and loves the attention it brings to him. Sometimes the courtiers slip up, illicit money falls from their over stuffed pockets, or the Iron Mask slips from the latest guest to enter the hospitality of the dungeon. We are all shocked when we recognize them. They had seemed so nice. There is the polite kerfuffle which used to entertain the peasants for weeks at a time, but now is only enough to cause us all to look up for a moment or two from our lives, if that. Life has become so hard these days, what with the plagues spreading so rapidly and randomly. Even the chickens have slowed down on their egg production, as if they fear bringing their young into the world. It is all we can do to curse them all under our breath and hope for a better day, knowing, all the while, that there is no heroic knight riding to save us; no magical cure from the King’s madness. There is always another pretender nearby, humming his idiosyncratic song of death.
(April 28, 2025)
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Ashes to Ashes
I watch the hollowed out building burn.
Sections of roof collapse into the flames.
Smoke occludes the sky like a prayer.
I am complicit.Smoke and ash smudge my hands and face,
a negligent guilt through willful ignorance.
I am at a loss: I call, I write, I vote;I make signs for marches.
The flames burn hotter.
They buy more gasoline and matches,then dance unimpeded down the road
to sing gleefully around the next bonfire.
(April 15, 2025)
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Morning After
by
anxiety, autumn, change, cycle, despair, existential angst, fall, hope, meditation, poetry, politics, sonnets, transition, worry
The sky hangs low and grey; the first
true cool spell since early last spring
thundered through a few nights ago.
The election is over, and the beast
has returned once again to power,
a bitter creature bent on revenge.
Today, I must finish cleaning up
the house after last night’s party,
which broke up early and dissolute.
It is difficult to be hopeful as fall
deepens toward the winter solstice
even with its celestial cliches:
as darkness grows, the light remains;
a millstone slowly grinds all to dust.
(November 7, 2024)
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After wandering lost,
circling familiar trails,
I brought us here again:
a reflection in a mirror
of a mirror’s reflection.
If I turned to you now,
my face in your eyes,
your face in my eyes,
and supposed
a vision of love,
would much change
from what it was,
or what we have become?
(September 26, 2024)
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I am Tired
by
I am tired of words,
the anxious necessity
to hear, if only
my own stifled whispers.
I am tired of talk:the exchange and banter
enmeshed in daily
guilts and desires.
I am tired of listeningto my stillborn story,
unsure each moment
if I’ve said it before.
I’m tired and uncertain;there is no end, no beginning.
(July 13, 2024)
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I would like to say
I was just visiting
that I had somewhere elseto be where I belonged
a secret place otherthan this constant vigil
I would like to saythis was a pleasant trip
that it is time to goback home again
but none of that is trueI have no where to go
and loneliness is allthat happiness is not
(June 21, 2024)
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