Author Archives

Bill Pearse publishes memoir, travel journals, poetry and prose, and lives in the Pacific Northwest.

• Life is in the margins

  By Bill Pearse on April 14, 2015 • ( 35 )

  

  People go to blogger conferences for about as many reasons as people blog. I went to the first one hosted by WordPress in Portland a few weeks ago with the simple goal of being inspired, and learning how to navigate… Read More ›

• Lying on life insurance applications

  By Bill Pearse on April 12, 2015 • ( 18 )

  I don’t like to lie, I’m not good at it. But there are times it’s expected, even when they insist you tell the truth, like on life insurance applications. Lying is expected but never out in the open, never outright,… Read More ›

• A slurry of scraps and symbols

  By Bill Pearse on April 11, 2015 • ( 10 )

  

  We drink the blood of Christ from plastic cups and it turns our tongues red, seals us in our symbols and the art of make believe that is faith, belief without proof. And as I enter you I forget myself,… Read More ›

• When she knew

  By Bill Pearse on March 26, 2015 • ( 11 )

  

  They fell asleep by the light of the Visualizer on the laptop but the sound was tinny and the light from it cold, and neither one of them wanted to go to sleep but they both did without deciding to,… Read More ›

• Then I was the remnant of a tale (for Carver)

  By Bill Pearse on March 25, 2015 • ( 15 )

  

  It is a nothing day, a gray day, a throwaway day and I have disappeared into a crack in the sofa with all those forgotten things, a no-man. I have dream-drafts to send me off, sounds of the dryer and… Read More ›

• From the throat, a crow’s hand

  By Bill Pearse on March 24, 2015 • ( 14 )

  

  We are several hours away in the hills, the desert steppe, a friend’s cabin, down a dead end road that leads to a lake, a quarry, so quiet you can hear the gravel on the shoulder when we pull over… Read More ›

• Hold me put, here

  By Bill Pearse on March 20, 2015 • ( 15 )

  

  It’s either a dead worm or part of a banana adhered to the grout in the kitchen tile; it’s gotten that bad, the house. Shrew-killing season in full swing for the cats and some, catch and release style. The cats… Read More ›

• Drunks are like fruit trees

  By Bill Pearse on March 19, 2015 • ( 26 )

  

  I changed my pants today, which is notable because I took a vow to keep wearing the corduroys until I got the garage done, and that was a week ago last Tuesday. Yesterday, I found a draft of a story… Read More ›

• What we keep, who we are

  By Bill Pearse on March 12, 2015 • ( 40 )

  

  I’ve broken through a membrane in our garage, the garage that’s bigger than some apartments I’ve lived in, where our kids can ride their bikes or scooters when there’s no cars and I’ve cleared the boxes to the side. The garage,… Read More ›

• When the skin once so taut loses shape

  By Bill Pearse on March 10, 2015 • ( 11 )

  

  I got to the intersection and wasn’t sure which way to go. When there’s nowhere to go and you can go anywhere, it’s like spinning a Roulette wheel, deciding which way to go. I took the same, windy road that day I… Read More ›