-
STATUS OF LIBERTY
Do us a favorhold backon your tired, your poor.We’re no longer real hoton those yearning to be free.We left it on the plaquebut no one’s supposedto read them anyway.Take the hint,we closed the Island,made it a museumthat oughtto tell you something.Emma’s dead, get it,and Lazarus, welljust read your Bible.We closed the sweatshopsand shipped outall those…
-
ONE WAY TICKET
He steps off the train. He looks around expecting her to be there. She said she would meet him. It is why he came. She does not answer her phone. As the night approaches, he gets a text message, waits patiently for the next train back to where he started. Appeared in 50 Word Stories,…
-
ET TU
As kids every couple of weekswe’d take our allowances,go down to the variety storeand buy the latest DC comic. Larry and I would spendthat afternoon imaginingwe were whatever superherowas featured in our new,and now most prized book. Jimmy was with usall the way, but admittedhe wanted to be Lex Luthor oror the Joker, or better…
-
ONE MORE, MORE
That there is another shootingcomes as no surprise,it is commonplace now, expectedand there are only questions:how many this time, whatkind of weapon was used, whatmotivated the shooter to do it. What does it say when we definemass killing as requiring threeor more dead bodies in one place. The body of the single victimis no less…
-
AND TO YOU WE LEAVE . . .
Of course we did not heedthe warnings, what did they know,and anyway we were sure we had won. History is a poor teacher, thatmuch we have demonstrated againand yet again, lessons never learned. It is how we got here, how wehave no clear path to leave here,things assumed lying in ruin around us. We are…
-
WITH KNOWING
With knowledge comes somethingbut I cannot remember whatmy mother told me it was, orperhaps it was a teacherwho said it, but I can’t hopeto tell which one it was, Icannot remember someof their names or in what gradeit might have been said.I don’t think it was in collegeor graduate school since by thenit was assumed…
-
OF A WOMAN
I wasn’t born a woman,I cannot bear a child,I cannot carry a fetus nine monthsI cannot feel the morning sickness,I cannot nurse a child once born,I cannot cease to be who I ambecause I had a child,I cannot be raped and made pregnant,I cannot be subject incestmaking me pregnant,I cannot go through the pains of…
-
BRAD AND I
Its painful to now say itbut perhaps Uncle Samgot it partially right whenhe shaved our heads andhad us march aroundLackland Air Force Baseas the war raged on in Vietnam,but when you talk about Uncle Sam,the bar is set rather low. We did all look ridiculous,from the large guy who oncewas the town bully for certainto…
-
GO TO YOUR ROOM
When a petulant childacts out badly, a parentwill send the childto a corner, to his room,for a “time out”the duration of whichdepends on the child’soffense and demeanor. What are we to dowhen the child hasno parents, answersto no one, even his adultchildren, where can we,the observers go, whatcan we do except cringein horror knowing thischild…
-
AT THE CAFE
We sit acrossfrom each otherseparated bythe small tablethat teeters,her cappuccinolicking at the rim.My toes danceagainst hersand she looks upquizzically.I smile and reachfor her handtouching her fingersfeeling the fine silverof the rings on each.She pulls her handback and looksinto the richbrown sheen.I stare out the windowat the odd carlookingfor a spacein the overfull lot,then pullingback ontothe…
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
an old writer and his words 