Handful

just a handful of words

clutched in a clenched fist

until thrown upon the page

loaded like bright dice

spreading a clean stain

till they cover the sheet

and are there

for all to see

Readings

Reading poetry

or prose

out loud

to a crowd

is as silly

as birdshit on a golfer’s cap.

A writer sits in a room and writes

a reader sits in a room and reads

alone

and life is good.

They are not group activities

not pinochle or charades,

thank the stars.

Good poetry,

who knows?

But read it the way it would be spoken

and that will be quite enough.

Promoting a Culture of Reading

We just want people to read our work, they said

very earnestly

and then they marched down the main street

arm in arm

a show of solidarity

people won’t read their work

maybe they have,

and that’s why the words sit on the shelves

musty as empty houses.

Unfinished Business

Everything is a draft

1^st draft, 2^nd draft, 3^rd draft

whatever

nothing is ever finished

it can always be made better

but death puts an end to revision

lives are not drafts

Life

Beauty

with a hurt

thanks to Claudie Hiles for Life