A Secret Salvation
Monday morning wet
in the window-framed garden,
Finding a Place in the World
I didn’t accept my place in the pack, I railed against it, tried to change it, kept assessing it, and expecting it to change, that my position in the pecking order was something I could change by the will and work of my ego and the host of personas I was throwing at the world.
The River
It contains a kind of magical quality, not the ridiculous optimism that many Christians seem to engage in: that belief is an insurance policy against tragedy and pain. This magic works through reversal, downturns inconstancy, instability, uncertainty, unpredictability, and invites, by its very flow, the willingness to face all these on our part.
Now I am 54
In honour of others, especially Matt Haig (see his book ‘Reasons to Stay Alive’), who have been open and honest
Meeting my Father-in-Law
Yesterday would have been my Father-in-Law Donald Malcolm’s 90th birthday, what a man. Here is the poem I wrote for
History of Brooklyn
No one rejects, dislikes, or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful. Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself. No one rejects, dislikes, or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful.