Poetry, biography, and children's book author
Words carved on an antique box: J.A. Egen, Prisoner of War, Burt's Island, Bermuda, November 11, 1901 What proof do we need of existence? Sometimes only a carved letter box inlaid with lilies, the corners coupled in half-blind dovetails. A box chiseled by a prisoner of war, a South African Dutchman who fought the British… Continue reading Inside an Old Wooden Box
We found a string of jewels never meant to berevealed on a Monday morning—not here, not on the lawn beneatha king palm tree on a city street— a luminous necklace of intestinesdangling from the spine of an animallocked in fetal position, fur trailinglike orange hair yanked out of a brush. You said too big for… Continue reading At the Intersection with Wildness
you mourn over the death of your hair in all five predictable stages of grief you went missing the moment your hair fell out in the emergency room bathroom you stare in the mirror day after day to make sure you continue to live often you panic over your naked head, a half-bodied hermit crab… Continue reading Because of Cancer
Sixty years gone and I still hear those beats and feel the throb of an army snare drum— three measures rolled with an even pulse, the fourth one choked and abruptly stopped. They spoke of a sixties news telecast, the late autumn hours, a nation that wept, the caisson that lumbered with iron regret, a president’s widow… Continue reading When the Drum Told the Story