Monthly Archives March 9, 2023

. The Very Best Business by Giuseppe Gioachino Belli (1791-1863) translated from Romanesco by Joseph S. Salemi First I was a gardener (a disaster), Then a bookseller. I made even less. So did I change my...

. El Melon There is a maze or map on melon skin Even the blind could read and seek to solve. A little girl watches the housewives, deft, Touching the head shapes swiftly, one by one, Until they somehow know...

. Poet Tree Legacy: The Saga Begins is a 14-chapter narrative poem. In this excerpt, the adolescent hero Abelbee, who has to venture deep into the Great Wood to find wise Vallenbee, arrives at...

. Why Strike? With prices high and living standards low, Our times are like what our grandparents knew. They fought world war; we slave for war abroad And soon will labor through retirement too. We export...

. Farinelli A thousand thanks, Martini, for your visit. Bologna is a town of balladeers. You’ll love it! Now I wonder, how long is it Since we both quit Madrid? Ah! Twenty years Since I last sang before the...

. Lean on Him after Ecclesiasties We labor long beneath the sun. Forgotten soon by everyone. We come from dust and end the same, Depart this life just like we came. It’s all just chasing wind...

. Gossip “There is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it hardly becomes any of us to talk about the rest of us.” ---Edward Wallis Hoch Its spice, its ire, its hot...

. Evolution I can’t run fast or jump high anymore. Mistakes I make I never made before. Some maladies and aches don’t have a cure, Alertness and reflexes are less sure. My memory is challenged on most...

. Homeric Hot or Not (Hotness Ratings Out of 10) . 10 By birth divine and radiantly tressed And beautiful and of a charm possessed That turns men into pigs if she’s inclined, A better girl than Circe none...

. Before Going to Sleep as a Boy I saw Him when I closed my eyes, Gazing down sidelong, seeing all, Serenely, stoically wise. I knew that judgement was to fall But found His habit was to look Past me—a...

. Ruben “We have words that speak of the ongoing presence of such privations: orphan, widow, widower. And perhaps the fact that we have no word for the parent who has lost a child is itself a testimony...

. Civics 101 Jejune excuses used too many times Do not undo the doer from the deed: A miscreant accused of many crimes Is not the type of model children need. A partisan devoted to a cause Who votes his...

. Of When I Lived in Prague--- I wander through a maze of gold and stone, Mosaic pavement watched by gilded faces; Bridges, towers etched with cryptic traces Of bygone kings that haunt a bygone throne. I...

. Eulogy for a Them We gather here to celebrate a him Or her (an it? a they?) and in the end A prophet of the present who could bend Reality to suit their loosest whim. For whatsoever they had been or...

. Screened. I. The Phony Mom a true story Her phone, in hand above the stroller, Blocked her baby from her view. She held it like a game controller, Adoring every pixel’s hue As mothers not so long...

. Peach Blossom Dreaming Peach blossoms furnish inwrought dreaming room Intangible to fingertips corrupt; __Substantially beyond each tapered petal’s plume Flow fragrances to subtly interrupt The wintry...