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OLD MEN
It is always odd watching older men gather, talk about their lives, about how much they no longer remember, of last year, and a decade ago, about the infinite details they can clearly recall about the time they spent in the Army, Navy, Air Force, the smell of Slop-on-a-shingle, of field stripped butts in a…
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A POET IS
A poet is a child who on seeing a blank page must fill it with dreams hears the song of the nightingale in the din of passing traffic comforts the lonely mother recalling the pain of a thousand births sees in each passing cloud the tears of a generation feels the heat of the sun…
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REFLECTING ON THE HARBOR
On the anniversary of the start of a war one feels almost compelled to speak to its horrors, its cause, its effect. But we live in an age where wars are plentiful, when peace is the exception and war seems to loom around every corner. So on this anniversary I watch the snowy egret stare…
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GABRIEL, AT HOME IN OHIO
I saw an angel settle slowly over Akron dancing in the smoke rising out of the stacks of the ancient plant. It flitted, darting in and out of the gray haze, one moment she, the next he, and as the sun settled slowly down, for an instant no more than a cherub. It was not,…
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THEN AGAIN
1970. The evening news is a procession of body bags, the halls of the VA Hospital are a storehouse of shattered bodies. He sits with a surreal placidity cross-legged on the small cushion, the corners of his eyes pulling up as if lost in thoughts of Kyoto. I sit, knees creaking even then, across the…
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THE SEA
Sitting on the shore, I asked the sea to tell me of life. The sea said the sky was a hungry suitor always trying to devour her. The sea said doves no longer lived atop the mountains. The sea said men embraced wars because they feared love. The sea…
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CHAPERONE
There are three ducks on the pond, two female, one male, and none says anything that is remotely profound. Half a world away, a man carefully parks a truck at the edge of a crowded Baghdad market and walks quickly away. Three ducks swim side by side by side around the pond, every now and…
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MISSING PERSONS
I enter the station house and walk up to the neck high desk. I would like to report a missing person. I have been gone more than twenty-four hours. I can’t give a very good description, my eyes see in the mirror a still young man sitting in a park in Salt Lake City in…
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an old writer and his words 