Should still be true (Bronk)

That desire holds! That, at fifty, what I said
at twenty should still be true! That in thirty years
no one should show me wrong! I was wrong! I was wrong!

William Bronk, from "At Fifty"

Simpler than it is

When you portray something as simpler than it is to facilitate understanding, you ultimately and inevitably inhibit understanding.

New poems

+15

The best faith

What is wanted is not faith in tomorrow, but in our ability to respond to tomorrow's demands.

Humpty Drumpfty

Humpty Drumpfty tried to build a great wall,
Mexicans, Syrians—Drumpfty was afraid of them all.
All the executive orders and Twitter tantrums he used to spread fear
Couldn't make the rest of the world disappear.

When a nation goes mad

When a nation goes mad,
those it can least abide
are those of its own
who remain sane.

New poems

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Nobody knows (Nathan)

Where I come from
Nobody knows;
And where I'm going
Everything goes.
The wind blows,
The sea flows—
And nobody knows.

Robert Nathan, Portrait of Jennie

Pretty good points

Light is pointless in the deep dark of space.
Except for the stars—they make some pretty good points.

Pickle barbecued chicken

From a recipe in an old pickling cookbook. Quite tasty!

Inevitable

It was inevitable that I would reject the inevitable.

Our own way (Eliot)

The mistakes that we male and female mortals make when we have our own way might fairly raise some wonder that we are so fond if it.

George Eliot, Middlemarch

Patterns

All patterns seem pedantic
to those who struggle with meaning.

On necessity

Necessary is negotiable
until it isn't.

New poems

+15

That woman

The woman that all other women remind you of—that's the woman you love.

And fighting a dual-front war with the intelligence agencies and the media...

When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.

(not) Sinclair Lewis/Huey P. Long

Truly

Willful ignorance is a moral failing.

Spinebind

Spinebind has published my poem "A Window" in their Issue #4. For some reason, they center-justified it, at least in the .pdf version, but it's still great to be included with the other work here.

Who

Who can endure the attention—still less, the love—of a god?

New poems

+15

The darkest day for the United States since the Civil War

The stars

The stars are redeemed
only by the space between.

Sopa de Chile Poblano

From this recipe.  Excellent!

Too much

We pay too much, and to the wrong debtor.

The solution

The solution doesn't always lie in the solution.

New poems

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Fair and Unfair (Francis)

The beautiful is fair.  The just is fair.
Yet one is commonplace and one is rare,
One everywhere, one scarcely anywhere.

So fair unfair a world.  Had we the wit
To use the surplus for the deficit,
We'd make a fairer fairer world of it.

Robert Francis

When what is done is done

When what is done is done, it must be justified, its necessity and appropriateness quickly and firmly established so that it never need be (ideally, never can be) considered, much less questioned, again. Fortunately, the mind, thus called upon, rarely balks and almost never fails to settle the matter in the manner desired.

On truth

Truth cannot be found without the coordinate of time.

Usually.

Acceptance follows familiarity.

Grilled salmon omelet w/ spinach & kale

Let me be honest

A moment of honesty is not always a moment of truth.

Our desires (Proust)

Our desires interweave with each other; and in the confusion of existence, it is seldom that a joy is promptly paired with the desire that longed for it.

Marcel Proust, In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower

New poems

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My view

If you feel there are things your eyes must not see, then close them, fool. But never undertake to impede my view.

The prism

Dogma ever will schism.
Truth survives the prism.

Chicken and spinach in lemon-garlic cream sauce

Understanding

Understanding brings us closer,
which is why it is often rejected
by those more comfortable at a remove.

Accidental

Even the intentional is accidental.

On life

The longest life is but a moment before death.

New poems

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The universe

Is the universe large enough
that even the truth can get lost in it?

Frame

Frame is filter.

On self

Self is what looks for self.

A Window

Spinebind Magazine, a quarterly literary magazine based in Brisbane, Australia (my first Australian publication!), will be publishing my poem "A Window" in their next issue on January 20th. I'm very much looking forward to seeing this one.

Entitlement

We want what we feel entitled to,
and we feel entitled to want.

New poems

+15

Root vegetable stew

Made with potatoes, carrots, turnips, parsnips, celery root, golden beets, chayote, bell pepper, onion, and a little beef.

On maturity

Maturity is making the effort to be less brittle than your instincts (together with your position in the world) would, unopposed, lead you to be.

Quick 2016 Summation

Books Read:  86
Poems Written:  1259

Back into the range I prefer to be in for books read in a year, and the quality remains high. Last year set the record for number of poems written, and this year I wrote over 2.5 times as many! Don't suppose I'll ever come close to this total again. 2016 was not a great year in many ways, but it was excellent on these two personal measures.

On history

History happens quickly,
moves on quickly,
and is forgotten quickly.