Though it was early morning and a strange time to do it I lit a fire in the firepit with last night’s coals and the logs that were charred and dampened by the early morning rain. It could be hard… Read More ›
Poetry
Post to 1970s me
I want the innocence of the 1970s again. Of rollerskating to disco music as a kid. Roller coasters, carnival food, the Jersey shore. Fireworks displays, sidewalk chalk, the ice cream man. I miss the feel of an old phone, a… Read More ›
Season’s surplus
There is more life than I can use, so I squander it on fruitless things like video games or bad books or going to bed early. The funny way life inches forward mostly unseen. The spring blooms that would bring… Read More ›
Father figure
Now gone a long time, you could vanish forever Both of you my patriarchs, gone the same year: Dick and John, father-in-law, stepdad Dick with your hands shaking holding the drill, helping you repair the front steps— John and your… Read More ›
Ninety-nine words or less
Not reams of it, but baskets full of bad poetry. Enough to take up the corner of a normal-sized room. Haphazardly put there without regard. Left-behind objects of nominal worth. Left out in the sun or the rain too long… Read More ›
The drive back from Portland
The drive back from Portland is not just a drive back from Portland, it’s every drive you’ve ever made. It’s the roadtrips with the family, the one you made to the Redwoods, the one with a girlfriend in the late… Read More ›
New school blues
In the dream I am in my underwear and we are in a crowded public square this time of year, this going back to school time we are all of us in our underwear in our dreams looking down, wondering… Read More ›
Knowing what it’s like to be a snake
It was there on the trail I saw the snake and saw the world from that point of view To be a snake and never know what it was like to drive a car, read a book, or drink a… Read More ›
Orchid piece
In the dark, in the window, in its tiny pot the orchid grows. The angles and edges we hardly notice while the orchid works to inhabit its small space. And for us no different, the quiet stirrings, the browned leaves,… Read More ›
The back of love
I made a figure-four of my legs, and lay in bed longing for rest. This mattress, the same my mom and stepdad slept on for years. But after he died my mom moved to another room and the mattress remained… Read More ›
Bill Pearse 