• I WAS, BACK THEN

    Fifteen years ago, I tell them,I was invincible, nothing bothered me,nothing held me back and eventhe few surgeries were shortrest stops on a runner’s highway. I knew it would last forever, Iknew I was kidding myself. Now, aging, I am held togetherby titanium and injections,trying to fall apart withas much grace as possible. My little…


  • TWILIGHT

    In the twilight of the dove,that moment when the sun’sretreat has only just begunmy shadow stretchesever so slowly into oblivion. I hear it whisper to mea promise to return and Iwant nothing more thanto believe it, for the grantof another day is a smallwish granted, one I makewith the knowledge thatthe genie of age is…


  • LUNA PENDING

    From the heart of the nightthe moon appeared, or a smallcrescent of it, coy this nightas she is on a regular basis. She hinted at her fullness,but we knew that was stilldays off, the moon keptto a rigid schedule always. But her reticence this nightinvited the stars to takethe stage, some we rarely seewhether hiding…


  • STARS

    Once the winter starswrapped in their cloudy shroudshed frozen tears, unwillingto come out of hiding.We searched for them in vain,knowing our failure,retreating to the warmthof home, only to repeatthe failed effort on somany other nights. Now, here, the winter starsare usually fearless,some drowned by the moon,but she waxes and wanesand they reappear, the brightestnever fearing…


  • A VISION

    He loved the simple irony of it all. His vision was failing in one eye, likely might in the other, from macular degeneration. There was a hole in his vision thanks to his macula and geographic atrophy. And being a man of words he knew the best way to describe that spot, that hole, was…


  • THE CAT

    Pause and consider, if onlyfor a moment, this question,which you need not answeras you will be right andyou will be wrong regardlessof what you say in response. What if we are the cat insome Godly thought experimentand our degradation of the planetis the bit of radioactive material,of which we have in profusion. Are we alive,…


  • CELESTIAL RHYTHM

    It was a certain rhythm that he loved,one he felt it in total silence, yet it fadedin the presence of sound, a doumbekof the soul he would describe it. He remembered how it was beforetheir one god rendered him and his kindmere mythological creatures fit onlyfor poetry and dusty library shelves. He would have his…


  • HE WHO LAUGHS LAST

    The moon was kind enoughto linger this morning,knowing that I wanteda photograph, and thatI needed sufficient ambientlight to allow meto fully capture her visage.Sometimes she rises earlyand shows her facebefore the sun retreats.I suppose it may justbe vanity on the moon’s part,showing off for her brightersibling, certain I will neverpause to photograph Sol.Tomorrow it will…


  • YOU THERE

    We dance between wantingto know what is out there,and fearing that we are notany longer unique, just onemore in an endless stream. And then we have to wonderif the others, such as they are,wonder what is out there,and fear that they are notany longer unique, just onemore in an endless stream. Has it always been…


  • BOOM

    The end is coming. That is the inescapable result of a beginning. We don’t like that but we are powerless to do anything about it. We can dread it, but it will do no good. Or we can posit that every ending is followed by a beginning. That may give us temporary comfort. But perhaps…