I came across this poem in the course of destroying my handwritten journals: : Time has gone by. And I see I expected too much. SO: I never will see you, or touch you or hear you, again. Though I begged for a sign, just a flutter, a gossamer touch, Even YOU can’t, or won’t, … Continue reading For My Belovèd Dead →

That’s the title of JK Huysman’s 1884 novel about the Decadent movement, usually translated as “Against the Grain” or “Against Nature”. It’s a delightful very funny (IMHO) read. But I thought of the phrase “against nature” when I heard of the student riots in France this week. High school students rioting and setting fires because … Continue reading À Rebours! →

…..I don’t know whether any girls are reading this, but you, Readers, may know some, young women in their reproductive years. This is for you to pass on, please and thank you.  I call Summer 2026 the Season of the Witch.  Its presiding genii has definitely been the horrible defendant in the Massachusetts case, who … Continue reading Hey Girl! →

…and yet saw her more clearly than I have in years. I dreamed we were home, here, and it was still my parents’ day, they were alive. A sunny day and we were all just casually talking, planning the activities we usually did. Someone asked where my mother was. No one knew. But in the … Continue reading I Didn’t See My Mother in a Dream Last Night →

We saw one last night , at the West End Fair in Gilbert, Pa. It reminded me of a cockfight or dogfight, except then you remember of course that there are men inside the vehicles. But the growling, the higher keening sounds: you could almost believe you were watching feral cars! When I did remind … Continue reading Demolition Derby →

Today I’ve seen that clip of a robot running super fast, beating any human records, then crashing into a wall and being removed from the track—on a stretcher. It’s a laffriot—but why, exactly? I men , we already KNEW machines are much faster than humans. Who could catch up with a car? So what was … Continue reading The Robot Race →

Dandelion, hawkweed, daisies, clover, milkweed, brown-eyed Susan, butter’n’eggs, goldenrod, Queen Anne’s lace. This, as near as I can call to mind, is the seasonal procession of wildflowers here on our Plateau. We’re already at the last stage! The fields are egg-yolk yellow with goldenrod (but it’s beginning to brown), and dotted with the greeny-white celadon … Continue reading Pocono Parade →

Yesterday I subjected you to a rather maudlin, self-pitying piece about having lost a soul-mate, but I’m ashamed of it, kinda, since I have had and am still having the most wonderful, enviable life anyone could have. (So far. 😬🤞) Bereavements, such as everybody has to endure unless you die yourself at age 7 or … Continue reading Not So Speechless →

I just finished Kate Atkinson’s book A God in Ruins. And it made me so lonely. It was the way the siblings in her book talk among themselves. They’re all well-educated, intelligent people and they constantly, effortlessly refer in conversation to poems, plays, novels, they just reel off lines and phrases, knowing their interlocutor will … Continue reading Dull and Speechless Tribes →

A walk in the woods….there are two distinct kinds of that experience. Along a wooded trail, where you can appreciate the shade but don’t have to watch your feet. And, lost. Or off-trail, even when you know generally where you are. Oh it ain’t no jungle here on the Pocono Plateau. But there are certain..eco-niches … Continue reading In the Woods →