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METASTASIS
She could barely move her head the cancer climbed her spine reaching upward, clutching vertebrae reaching out, tendrils grasping tearing fragile organs. She would cry, but that would be an admission of defeat, a welcome to death. I cried out for her, entreated our God for compassion that she might stand by her sons when…
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THE VISIT
I have never visited the grave of my mother, either of them, which seems most odd primarily to me. The mother I never knew until it was too late to know her is buried in Charleston, West Virginia a place i intend to visit, grave site included in the coming months, to see where my…
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MOURNING
You never know how the news will arrive you are just certain of its arrival. You know it on some level, even as the event is happening, but that doesn’t blunt the piercing tip of the blade that finds the soft spot in you and cuts deeply. You hoped for a miracle for her, for…
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LBD PLEASE
She says every woman should own a little black dress, and during the time she tries them on I am thinking what she meant was every man should be married to and in love with a woman who wears a little black dress as well as she does, but I say It looks really nice…
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PUEBLO CHRISTMAS
The night is that bitter cold that slices easily through nylon and Polartec, makes child’s play of fleece and denim. The small rooms glow in the dim radiance of propane lights and heaters as the silver is carefully packed away in plastic tool boxes. The pinyon wood is neatly stacked in forty pyres, some little…
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LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER, NOT
My mother used to say, about most anything, “Stop, you’ve had your fill.” It was something she did by rote, dictated I was certain then, by some timer buried deep within her that brought forth the phrase like the beep of an oven timer to indicate whenever she was baking was certain to be just…
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SELF?
There is one thing that none of the books on discovering who you are when you are adopted bother to tell you. If the did, it wouldn’t change anything, but it is a burden you assumed you’d easily bear that grows heavy with time. What they don’t warn you is that you will discover yourself,…
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EDISON, GO TO HELL
My mother was a firm believer In lecturing, offering vast bits of knowledge, culled from here and there. One of her favorites was Edison’s 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration, and she leaned toward quantity, “It’s all about hard work, go clean your room, clutter will get you nowhere.” Sitting here today amid what I prefer to…
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HEAVEN CAN WAIT
He said, “I’m looking forward to heaven for a reason you cannot begin to imagine, and, not that I want to rush my arrival.” She said, “It’s rather audacious to assume you’ll end up there, I place the odds as at best at 50-50 and I’m being generous because I’m still in love with you.”…
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NAME THAT TUNE
He says, “I write songs without music, my head Is a libretto warehouse.” She says, “You string words like random beads, no two strands the same.” He says, “Symmetry is for those with linear minds who can’t see out of the tunnel.” She says, “Dysentery, verbal, is a disease to be avoided particularly by poets.”…
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an old writer and his words 