Where Are Those Friends?
This poem emerged from my ongoing (never-ending?) archiving project. I’m sure it reflects a widespread feeling. Where are those friends who have drifted downstream so far from our still grinding …
I’m Telling You Walls
Find what you want or need to in this poem. It just showed up from nowhere. I’m telling you walls, stay firm on foundation, don’t walk off this land on …
Highlands Book Fair
On Saturday, September 11, I will be at the “Celebration of Books” in the Highlands Civic Center, Highlands, NC, from 9 am to 3 pm. Around 12:20 I will be …
Poetry: Musing and Reading
On Thursday, August 19, I will be reading and reflecting on my poetry at 10:30 am for the “Coffee with the Poets” group at City Lights Bookstore, Sylva, NC. The …
Ligaments of Love
Ligaments of love hold life erect, pump tendrils out across the clearing where the giant tree has fallen. In dappled light we gather, sing, let weeping like lianas fall to …
Body Match
For many years Sylvia and I have kept a list of body types that seem matched in happy conjugation, as if drawn together by a magnetism created solely by their …
Plugged In!
I am finally and hopefully able to send out announcements of recent postings after a two-month hiatus due to a malfunctioning “plug-in” that wouldn’t work in my new server. I …
On the Trail
Walking in his moccasins I felt a pain shoot up my leg. I tried to shift terrain, find smoother ground, a grassy place rolled flat. I shook my foot and …
Celebrating FRESH
To celebrate the second issue of Fresh, the new literary magazine edited by J. C. Walkup, Buffy Queen, and Penny Morse, I will join former NC Poet Laureate Fred Chappell …
Desert Beauty
Where water hides divorced from shimmering air, and plants stand sentinel within unbounded space,… (The remainder is deleted, because the poem is under submission.)
Poem for Mothers
You yielded to creation’s flow in trust, in hope, Emerging uncontrolled cries of pain and joy radiating from your core. Each task accomplished, left behind in …
Photographic Memories
My reflections on memory continue, heightened by preparations for my talks at the Collegiate Peaks Forum next month. Here’s another poem in that series. Old photographslaid out upon the table,still …
The Gift of Ninety
We have recently returned from a trip to Florida to celebrate my only remaining Aunt’s ninetieth birthday. It was a festive occasion in which she danced and laughed exuberantly. Her …
Lie, lay, lain, laid, lied
Beset for years by the popular destruction of English grammar (“lie and lay” being the bete noire) and dumbfounded by the sorry saga of John Edwards’ scandalous behavior, I wrote …
Bluegrass at the Boston Roundtable
Last week I spent some time in the Boston area, where I helped lead Tom Porter’s seminar on Restorative Justice at Boston University School of Theology before moving on to …
Good Stock
I recently received an inquiry from Pamela Hanson, who asked if I knew of a poem that could be read at a memorial service for her father, Roland Hanson, who …