Solitude Takes It All

Hello. Who are you? Whoever you are, whoever you believe yourself to be you need to do You well. Be best You, because I am. Made that way by crushing forces, heat you never dreamed and fear daring me to be afraid and I can prove it, because when no on there applauds or spits…

Licked

It all started with the postage stamps. They sold for a penny or two. Maybe three and celebrated, no make that commemorated people and events. Make that real people and events.   Two things happened at the same time. The price of the stamps went up and the cost of the stamps went down.  …

Zeno’s Revenge

I had this professor back in college. I guess I grew up in a time when we realized not all professors were very bright. Maybe I grew up since. Anyway, this professor gave us an assignment to answer Zeno’s Paradox. Here’s how it goes. Zeno asked, “How long does it take an arrow to reach…

In Defense of the Realm

When much younger, listen to me children, I wrote out my heart on pieces of paper and sent them all away out to the world and the world unfailingly threw them back into my face, all of them into a face they never knew.   Oh yes, rejected, neglected, incarcerated without trial or appeal they…

A Dragon’s Tale

I met a dragon. It’s one of the dragons who live in our neighborhood. I heard him the other morning breathing out by the curb. I mistook the sound for a neighbor shoveling snow, you know, the rhythmic rasping a shovel makes on pavement. “How are you doing?” I asked. “Not bad,” he replied. “Yourself?”…

SHAME

To the Pathetic Members of the Extraordinary Session of the Wisconsin Legislature There are desperate people in this State. People who can’t get out of bed in the morning because they’re so sick or afraid or depressed or impoverished or hooked on some filthy drug they took because they were in pain or sick or…

God Loves Me

Today I went to a bookstore and bought a book. I did not intend to buy the book and the bookstore deals in used books so of course I could not buy a very new book, so I took particular delight in buying an old one. I bought a book printed in 1897. That kind…

Purple

You wear a purple coat and all you do is professional, as all of it should be. The purple is a good color for you, but beware the label, that it never betray you to the harsh reality of the world, never become the face you fall behind, without a smile because cold and harsh…

Route Cause

I don’t want to go the shortest way. I don’t want to go the fastest way. I don’t want you to tell me which way to go or how many feet I need to go before I turn left or right. I don’t want to go at all if I can’t find a way I’ve…

434

Let me tell you something. I’ll only say it once. I won’t repeat myself. Even if you’ve heard the words before, listen carefully. I went into darkness and silence was there. Total darkness and total silence. Brothers and sisters of the same mother and the same father. My next of kin. I heard the words…