• EYE TO EYE

    So tomorrow he’ll tell meit’s stable and he will smileI think that’s why he wentinto ophthalmology and notoncology, telling patientsthat they have cancer and thensmiling wouldn’t play welland I am willing to bet that hecannot help himself, heis just one of those smilers.And strangely, I will take solacethat my right eye is notappreciably more blindthan…


  • A HAIKU

    golden rice shootsunder Fuji’s eye –farmer stops for tea First published in To Live Here: A Haiku Anthology, Wee Sparrow Press, 2023 Sometimes good things come in the smallest packages. This is a wonderful, international collection of haiku by some amazing poets. You can find it here, it is well worth the purchase:https://www.amazon.com/Live-Here-Haiku-Anthology/dp/8409528169/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2FVGMQCD12NUW&keywords=to+live+here+a+haiku+anthology&qid=1691607414&sprefix=to+live+here%2Caps%2C104&sr=8-1


  • OCULUS

    I avoid telling people that Iam going blind in my right eyefor they always seem surprisedas if it should look differentor worse, they say “but it mightnot happen,” when I knowthe only way that is truehis if I die sooner, not somethingI want and if I told them thatwould be something for which theywould fumble…


  • THEATER OF THE ABSURD

    If Aristophanes were suddenlyto arrive here, he would no doubtpause, but with the eye he had,would soon discover such a treasuretrove of material, he could producecomedies to last several lifetimes. The problem would be in findingthe right audience, for here we havelittle taste and patience for the sortof comedy at which he was so adept,and…


  • DO AS I SAY

    Eat your vegetables,Don’t ever run with scissors,Clean your room,Always wear clean underwear,Comb your hair every morning,Always say please and thank you,Always listen to adults, they know more,Be nice to animals and small children,Clean your room,Don’t go in the water for an hour after eating,Polish your shoes,Don’t play with sticks, you could put an eye out,Clean…


  • 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…


  • REINCARNATION

    In my next lifeI want to come backas a Great Blue Heron. I will majesticallystand by a lake, capturingfish, capturing the eyeof all who wander by,pausing in awe and desire. And I will havethe one thing I knowI now lack, that traitthat has escaped mefor far too many years,patience, the abilityto stand and stareuntil the…


  • COMING BACK

    He appears, rising from the horizonthe sun at his back, as if a miragetaking physical shape and form. He approaches slowly, your eyesstraining to separate himfrom the sun’s growing glow. You wonder if his is a holy manrobed and with a staff, walkingto announce his long awaited return. As he grows closer, you realizehe is…


  • ANCESTRY

    Children have an innate senseof their ancestry.I was a child of the cityit’s streets my paths, alwaysunder the watchful eyeof my warden – mother. Dirt was to be avoidedat all possible cost,so I never dug my handsinto the fertile soil of myvillage in the heart of Lithuania,or tasted the readying harvestthat dirt would remember. I…


  • OCULUS

    There is little goodyou want to say aboutMacular Degeneration, lessabout geographical atrophy,nothing it seems you can dountil it crosses that lineand wetness sets in. But there is one hiddenadvantage and thatis the magical powerto make people headlessand cars disappearon the highway. All I need do is shutmy left eye and if I amten feet or…