Sorry for the delay in updating this newsletter. Time just goes too fast to keep up with. Finishing and submitting the manuscript for the next book in my Dick Hardesty detective series kept me pretty busy. And though I'd intended to take a short break, I got caught up almost immediately in the next book.

The second book in the series, "The Butcher's Son" will be available from www.glbpubs.com/ebindexnov.html by June 15, 2001 if not a few days before. The first chapter will be available for reading, free, and you're invited to drop in to see it.

Following the pattern of including a few poems with every newsletter (more news "note" actually), here are a couple I hope you might enjoy:

The Spider in the Tub

I turn on the water,
adjusting the spray,
and turn to reach the soap.
on the far end of the tub
behind the shower curtain.

In one corner of the tub
a tiny spider struggles
to climb the slick surface
which offers no grip,
even for one so small.

I turn off the water
and reach through the curtain
for a tissue, which I place
in front of the spider,
hoping it will climb on.

It does not, and thus ensues
a game in which I coax
and it evades.
Eventually, it gets on,
and I lift it to safety.

Why so much time
spent to save a spider?
Because it is alive,
and life is a precious gift
too soon reclaimed.

A spider's life
may mean little
to most people,
but it means a lot
to God, the spider, and me.

Copyright 2001 by Dorien Grey

Reality and I

Reality and I barely speak.
We are like old friends
who have had a falling out
and never reconciled.

I feel reality has betrayed me.
It promised so much
and now has taken away
much of what it had given.

Reality, I'm sure,
sees me as scornfully frivolous;
insulted by my refusal
to accept its authority.

And all this might be
a bit more tolerable
were we not
Siamese twins.

Copyright 2001 by Dorien Grey
******

Until next time, thanks for being here.