Skin Graft

I once witnessed a skin graft.
It was for my job.  In the
O.R. is not like on TV.
The smell of cauterized flesh and
Sight of blood and guts are very real.
It changed how I see the world.

Three surgeons wielding their instruments.
Nurses, anesthesiologist, technicians.
All comporting themselves professionally.
No Grey’s Anatomy T.V. serial this ( Read more... )

I'm listening to this audiobook C lent me. I don't remember the name, but it is about these four people that meet on the roof of "Toppers" in London. It is a place, like the Golden Gate Bridge, where people famously jump. Anyway, I was thinking about why suicide resonates. Each of the stories potential jumpers despairs her or his future. It ( Read more... )

We went to a wedding yesterday, up in Napa. It was a wonderful wedding. Friends that I have known for a long time. There were many other work acquaintances and friends there also. I had a good time except that there was a lot of distance between my wife and I. My friend D has been living with B whom I also know very well for several years, and ( Read more... )

I wrote this and the first version of the poem previously posted in my paper journal yesterday.

The challenge is to live in this constant awakeness, as the currents move through this thing called redslime ( Read more... )

Poem for the Plaza

Breaking from my work ( Read more... )

my daughter of 10 ½ years was writing poetry for a class assignment. Lovely little sentiments:

“Hop into the silence to make it joyful”

“Paint all the questions”(actually she wrote “joy fool,” which I like better, but she changed it after informed of her mistake ( Read more... )

The question that is pushing me. (As I wrote that, I realized that it might be a greeting these days.) I am noticing that I am fighting being here with what is. I know that I know what is, but the ego structure that I identify as me wants something else to be ( Read more... )

The organ of truth in the human sure seems to be the heart. The heart loves commitment to an absolute, no matter what that absolute might be ( Read more... )

I wonder if other people are anywhere as confused as I am. I wonder if other people are as terrified of living. I wonder if other people are as glad to be alive. I have no idea who I am. I feel deranged at this moment. I am in a deep depression. I am afraid. I am afraid of my own non-desire to make the world make sense again ( Read more... )

Naked in bed, next to wife and lover.

Stretch, exercise, and practice.

Everywhere I look I see no god

Only when I look everywhere does god become apparent.

Fruit from your own orchard

Enjoyed after the labor of picking

No, wonder I want to stay here.

Not bad to wake up to.


( Read more... )