New poems

+15

Stories (Morgenstern)

He has walked through puddles of ink and left footprints that formed stories in his wake that he did not turn around to read.

Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea

Until

Choke the obscurantist with fact; make him miserable until he relents.

What history is (James)

That's what history is: the story of everything that needn't have been like that.

Clive James, Cultural Amnesia

Creamy Tortellini, Spinach, and Chicken Soup

From this recipe.

The synthesis (Gunn)

What could I do but seek the synthesis
As each man does, of what his nature is?

Thom Gunn, from "Merlin in the Cave: He Speculates without a Book"

On metaphor

Metaphor, whatever else it may be, is a distancing device.

Wasted

A day in which you learn nothing is a day wasted.

The age (Wilde)

We live in the age of the over-worked, and the under-educated; the age in which people are so industrious that they become absolutely stupid.

Oscar Wilde

New poems

+17

The cage

Perhaps the worst thing is to be smart enough to see the cage but not smart enough to escape it.

Quick 2019 Summation

Books Read:  75
Poems Written:  203

The fewest poems I've written since 2011, but I had a book and a chapbook published, so I guess that's a good tradeoff!