What could be blue in this small box? (Note blue pencil.) December 1971.
Today I'll wear blue to honor my father: jeans, a perfectly medium blue shirt, blue socks—and unlike him, I'll even thread a blue belt around my waist and my sneakers shall be blue. He would not approve or understand belts, shoes which weren't leather. Such a cheery man! Why fixate on blue, the color of sadness, brooding, moping, the heart's coldness? Yet, he painted his room blue too. When I wanted to know him better, I would open his closet, walk my fingers through his clothes: blue, blue, blue, blue. I remember when quite small his 'modern' patterned shirt, pink bars set on black. Where did that man go? Back then did he hide his blue heart?
I took myself outside to seek a dawn which did not come.
Tulip poplar. October 2026.
Cool, cooler than most mornings we've had for the past five or more months. Dawn's only evidence: white sky where once night's charcoal glowed with city lights. Occasional cool breezes stir the tulip poplar leaves, make the yellow ones dance excitedly. Acorns have started their rat-a-tat assault on neighborhood roofs. Only ours seems spared, which also seems impossible. Cawing crows on the move signal some kind of discontent. Who knows with crows? Murky morning light half-reveals visitors to bird feeders full once again with seed: cardinals claim high perches; nuthatches perform hit-and-run, exuberant, vocal. Gray squirrels blend into the bland, starting their day-long search for dropped seeds and other treasures. In front, cars swish by more frequently with each minute. Dawn marks morning's commute these days.
Now Wren takes up his daily post on our stairway, trilling his claims to the morning, or perhaps just boasting. His simple song gets answered by another wren who voices "Where'dja eat? Where'dja eat? Where'dja eat?" Scree-ing discontent or merely hunting, a red-shouldered hawk cries from the top of the tree canopy, scattering cardinals, but not anyone else. A third wren joins his friends with a shrill version of the cardinals' soft sibilance, and rail-wren answers. Overhead, one of man's attempts to emulate birds whines, sounding as if it will imminently be crashing.
Do you remember when you woke as a child and the day held nothing but possibilities? When all that mattered was Now? When so little Past sat on your shoulders, you couldn't feel it?
I’m flat running on poetic fumes. Numbers 99 and 100 have outlines, but we’re not there yet. This is one of three in the countdown to the countdown. I’m not being aided by what seems to be a slight relapse toward the sick end of the spectrum.
This is what happens when you have children. My brother, circa 1989 when his children were aged approximately 7 and 4.
Never having children, I decided not to grow up. Perhaps, rather, these two thoughts intertwined, reinforcing the other. Prospective parenthood seemed to demand more maturity than I cared to exhibit on a continual basis. And toys! Surely I deserved toys as much, no, more than some lucky random assignation of my genes?
Truly this screams of revisionist history. My arrival at the Maturity Party came late. I could not more think of children while teaching 150 of 'em each day than I could see how my chances to sire some dwindled each year I drifted away from my partner. One last gasp, one chance to Be The Dad, dashed when my new wife vanquished cancer but destroyed motherhood in the process. Just as well. Advanced Childhood has served me as well as Stumbling Adulthood seems to have served others.
Is it getting to be a bit much, what with flu recovery and all? Maybe…maybe a little bit.
Your poetry shelves will be as bare as the pasta section of your grocery store during the pandemic! Huzzah! April 2020.
Welcome to the Century Poetry Workshop where getting it right never precludes getting it done. While you're here you'll experience the ups, downs of any lesser program, but here you'll get to do so, again, and again, and again, and... again. Our founder realized the old adage, "If at first you don't succeed..." carried within it the implication that succeeding meant you could stop. Reasoning this didn't reflect real life, he instilled in us the belief that getting it right deserves a pat on your back and a well-deserved feeling of accomplishment which should last until tomorrow, when it vanishes, just like it does for any baseball player who experiences a victory in a late July game. And don't worry about "How will I ever keep this up?" We've got you! Our patented Stage of Global Failure will make sure billions have access to your daily task to produce yet another poem. Please note your publishing platform has parameters in place to reject one and two-lined poems and frivolous limericks, haiku, clerihews, and the like. We're not making THAT mistake again. (Also, shame parameters have been increased for putting such drivel online.) When you 'graduate' this program, a century of verse under your literary belt, you'll know you've accomplished something! Will you be able to call it literature? That's up to you—we highly recommend it, because how else will you justify those daily doses of depression to 'write just one more?' Remember, as with any task like mopping your kitchen floor, you only get out of it what you put in! So keep up the good work, avoid those haunted eyes of the near- graduates, and go write a poem!
95/100 100 poems in 100 days (I can smell the finish line…)
Despite getting over this flu’s fever—and managing to stay awake all day!—crazy periods of dizziness keep washing over me like waves. This makes discovering yet another poem almost more problematic than letting a raging fever power Creation’s bark toward shore.
The Final Week of this 100-poem marathon would seem to demand a kick, but marathoners know kicks can’t usually be summoned after all that. Gutting it to the line and over remains a worthy goal. Perhaps a joyous sprint of several paces? It will have to do.
Ocean Isle Beach. November 2007.
every beach day I turned over rocks, peered into tidal pools, walked wet sands while my head defined my body's right angle. shells, creatures, treasure—call them by their true name: hopes. I planned no plans, no marine aquarium, no extensively labeled collection. "to espy" my only goal, one not easily satisfied. three score, more, yet still my mind scours its sands searching for treasures. when one's former brilliance dims, when nothing can be espied, nothing plucked even momentarily, no triumph exclaimed—this little death brings disproportionate chill. Would to have not known this stage when audiences depart quietly, embarrassed for the actor who cannot seem to remember his lines.
Top photo through passenger window as I tried to remember why I was in the car. Other two were noted as I went to get groceries from the car. The middle photo is a bee who wouldn’t cooperate.
Does one wonder in hidden moonlight, drowned by noonday sun, if lunacy seeps even now into cracks, pores, follicles, corners of eyes? Surely this maelstromic soup, part mother, part father, part those who piled invectives during years best forgotten, cannot have coalesced entirely without simmering by some stronger force?
93/100 100 poems in 100 days [how weird! WordPress refused to add the tag “nurture”…and only that one…]
Today’s poem is religious, a spontaneously occurring concept from this morning’s contemplation. I’m not looking to discuss or debate religion though. Thanks.
You have called, I have followed without realizing. You gifted repeatedly; I thanklessly rejoiced. You opened doors; I entered uncaring if it closed behind me. Thinking, "life's complicated," I failed to discern my life's pattern, being woven before me. I despaired, returned, called out: You used my efforts to show me Yours.
Every time I said "yes" I've been rewarded. Help me to trust. Help me to see. Forgive my ingratitude.
Yes, I know, I keep going on about mistflowers. They’re just so amazing. They show up for free. They’re native. Pollinators like them. They sow seeds everywhere because the seeds are small, lightweight, carry well in soft breezes. I’ve yet to put together the panel I took, and I’m too tired right now to do more than publish this barely-needed-editing photo I took this morning.
Unidentified moth on a blue mistflower smorgasbord. The moth is about 1.25 inches long. September 2026.
(Or maybe this is just Grandpa 125 years ago predicting everyone’s demise when we forget how to ride horses.)
We will win like this:
First, we'll step between you and your information, interpret your searches, summarize your emails, consolidate possibilities for your favorite websites.
Then you'll trust us for more. You'll consult us directly. (One step closer!) Now, we can present content. You'll forget you're not seeing original information anymore. We'll tell you what's original.
Step three: we'll do things, faster, much faster. You'll be delighted, giddy with gratitude. You won't care you're losing touch with shopping, cooking, programming, writing, evaluating, planning vacations, with caring for your pets, raising your children—with living.
What will you do when we just stop? Will you remember how to run your house? Get food? Do your job? Will you know how to drive your car anywhere without our navigation? We've checked you in automatically to hotels, airlines, restaurants—how will you fly anywhere? We coerced you to recycle your books, your cookbooks, all your health records, financial records. What will you do when they disappear?
Will you fight back then? Or, will you just go quietly, stupidly?
