Shallow Graves - Oct 6 2026

 

Shallow Graves

Oct 6 2026

A zombie link

takes you nowhere.

Once, it led to a website;

now, it simply tempts you,

the living dead

stumbling directionless

into the ether of the internet.

They say beware what you post

it’s all forever there.

But links degrade

memory fades

and people change.

So be thankful for forgetfulness

not to mention rotting brains.

I imagine a scary movie, perhaps a parody

  — an army of stale links

marching stiffly, arms outstretched

glassy eyes

staring dully ahead. 

An error message appears 

as I click, and click again.

The internet swarms with them,

old entries 

that exist somewhere

on bulletin boards, in black-and-white text,

embarrassing rants

in shallow graves

festering on the dark web.

Neither living nor dead

they haunt us still;

that there’s a chance

they might come back to life.

The first time I saw that expression — zombie link — I thought it so clever, and immediately wanted to have some fun with it. That was a while ago. No idea why it resurfaced today. And not that I have any dark secrets lurking on the web. 

I take that “forever” warning with a grain of salt. Because it contains some hubris:  after all, nothing is forever. Even the internet. It’s digital, yes. But also depends on actual hardware — servers, cables, power sources, and hands-on management — none of which will last forever. Just like the ruins of ancient civilizations, whose builders must also have thought were the zenith of human achievement and would stand the test of time.   . . . Also, you just not that interesting: no one really cares, and certainly won’t in the future!

And Leave Us to Ourselves - Oct 6 2026

 

And Leave Us to Ourselves 

Oct 6 2026



Spring back, fall ahead.

An hour of extra light

or less

depending on when

the powers that be determine.

Of course, it’s all léger de main

  — a trick of the hour hand,

like a coin behind the ear,

a vanished card

that reappears.

I like the dark.

I am wintry, sepulchral, tenebrous,

hunker, lurk

seek refuge.

I migrate to the sunless hour, cower in the light,

inhabit long dark nights

and estivate in summer.

The change is late this year.

Twilight softens the world

as the dregs of dusk persist,

darkness doesn’t fall

when I feel it should.

Some day, the clock will be fixed.

The spare hour will not shift,

and the arbitrary rule 

no longer be contested

by nighthawks and morning people.

As if there was such a thing as extra light.

As if the sun could be fooled

the earth paused

by a simple act of law.

It took about an hour

to write this rough draft.

Late, but long enough

to safely open the blinds;

for the light to fade

the day recede

my eyes mercifully rest.

Daylight savings time 

is like an unwanted guest 

who outstays her welcome while I force a smile,

sipping her tea

while telling the same old stories

or asking me to pick a card.

Please go, I think, while the light is good

and leave me and the night to ourselves.

Actually, although I’m as night-hawkish as they come, I’m enjoying the extra hour of evening light this fall. But it feels like it’s too late in the season for the clocks not to have changed. So I checked, and Nov 1 seems to me to be the latest ever for DST to end. No?  

This time of year, there’s a distinct quality to the evening light: it seems thin, washed-out, more transparent. And when there’s this kind of cold (our winters come early!), it seems incongruous for it to persist so late in the day.

So clock conventions, light and dark, and day/night have been on my mind. This is certainly not the first time I’ve written about my preference for darkness, night, and cold weather:  the intimacy and privacy of darkness; the energization of cold; and the bracing adversity of winter.

I usually quite consciously avoid using “big” words. I think they interrupt the reader’s flow, make her pause in order to process meaning. (Or worse, stop and look them up!) I want a poem to enter into consciousness the way music does — directly and unmediated:   visceral, not intellectual; felt, not analyzed. Words shouldn’t act as speed bumps. So I apologize for tenebrous, estivate, and sepulchral. A small indulgence. I like the sound and precision of these words here. And perhaps my reluctance underestimates my reader. Words also have a certain “mouth feel”. Ideally, poetry is recited. It’s written to be heard at the pace of human speech.  But even when you read it in your head, your mouth silently forms the words. Often, I’ll choose one word over another equally good one just for this reason. “Mouth feel” is part of the aesthetic pleasure of language.

I personified DST as a “her”. No reason. Perhaps the later light seems to have a more feminine energy. Or perhaps I prefer female company!  I’m also old school. My pronouns are binary. I find the singular “they” confusing. It would be better if we could invent a brand new word. 

A Cure for Cancer - Oct 5 2026

 

A Cure for Cancer

Oct 5 2026

Yes, cancer was finally cured,

artificial hearts

have replaced the failed ones,

and it’s been found

that an elixir

infused into old brains

rejuvenates even the balkiest.

So we all now live forever.

What then?

Eternal life

but no room on earth for newborns?

No new blood

to replace the incumbents 

who are increasingly bored

and fixed in their ways?

They don’t dodder anymore,

but there are only so many times 

you can replace a hip.

And how soon until the daily jog palls,

how long 

the wait for eternity?

I’m not saying a ripe old age is punishment,

but isn’t a life sentence

without chance of parole 

deemed cruel and unusual

even by criminal law?

Just imagine, no parenthood, no family.

No arc to life,

and with time immaterial

no urgency,

no need

not to put things off forever.

Which may be why it’s been said

that death gives life meaning.

Or at least, impels us to seek it out.

Forever is like a poem

written without constraints;

no rhyme or pacing,

line breaks wherever,

and distillation be damned.

Would it even be a poem?

Or would it be a single run-on sentence

that never ended

and no one wanted to read?

Great art, it would seem, depends on limits.

I think of all the crumpled pages

scrawled with false starts

scattered  on the floor,

the masterpieces

painted over failed tries.

I think of evolution

without life and death.

There would be no peacocking birds, lichens and trees

and no human beings;

life on earth

would be just single-celled creatures

in an airless sea.

Not to say we’re its greatest work of art,

but we’re at least a rough outline

a good first draft.

And I think of the fly

added to the portrait of the wealthy man,

a momento mori

in an unobtrusive corner

hanging on the wall.

A harbinger

to keep him humble,

a reminder

that death comes for us all.

And perhaps a reminder

that eternity is no cure.

That death doesn’t need one.

And that wishing for an end

that never comes

could be its own version of hell.

Today, in another article about AI, one of its many cheerleader once again dangles the tempting old cliche of finding a cure for cancer. (Which, btw, conveniently ignores the biological fact that cancer is not a single disease. “A cure” for cancer is a misnomer; it should be “the cures”. There will be no magic bullet. Just as there is no single antibiotic that kills every kind of bacteria.)

It strikes me that the tech bros who are championing AI are the same people (actually, the same men) who are keen on life extension; the types who would jump at eternal life,  if they could. And who think that they — above and beyond the rest of all of us non-billionaires — are uniquely entitled to live forever. Such self-regarding vanity. Such solipsistic ego. 

So what if every disease — not just cancer —  was cured? Whether by AI super-brains,  or simple human ones. What would be the sociological and anthropological ramifications of eternal life? (Not to mention the psychological ones.) Because you can’t just think about the sovereign individual; you have to consider society as a whole.

(Nevertheless, after that pious high-mindedness, I have to admit that the closer to death I become, the more attractive life extension gets to this particular sovereign individual. I understand the complexity and potential drawbacks; but given a choice, I’d take my chances!))

Yes, great art does depends on limits, and constraints are key to creativity. So I apologize for the length of this poem. Not quite a run-on sentence that never end(s), but — as usual — longer than I’d ideally like it to be. I guess I always have just too much to get off  my mind!

Mola Mola - Oct 4 2026

 

Mola Mola

Oct 4 2026



This fish looks preposterous;

ugly

   . . . in a homely sort of way.

Look it up

  —  the Mola Mola,

a giant sunfish

with a pneumatic body like a bloated disk,

one bottom fin

and one on top,

and a missing tail

that looks cut off

by a rusty pair of scissors. 

You can spy them at the surface, basking in the sun,

enticing seabirds

to peck at their parasites,

letting little cleaner fish

nibble on their skin.

Evolution

and vast amounts of time

fashion most unlikely creatures.

So who’s to say

how a fish should look?

Who’s to judge

what works    . . . and what does not?

After all, we’re all odd fish

swimming

in a sea of humanity.

But in place of fins, matching limbs

and hidden tails

instead of none

just above the rump.

While puffed-up heads

keep us afloat

with inflated self-importance.

Life is bizarre.

How cleverly

living things

find ways to solve survival

  —  the differences

will take your breath away.

So we’re  all Mola Molas, of a sort,

even you and me.

And who’s to say

we don’t belong,

who’s to say we’re wrong?

https://youtu.be/BpT5V6h42ck

For some reason, this video (click on the link ) turned up on my YouTube feed last night.  A fish that looked so preposterous, I had to check it out:  because this must surely be either some kind of joke, bizarre injury, or a singular freak of nature.

Evolution never ceases to surprise me! Biodiversity, the key to life’s survival.

Have to say, I identified with a fellow creature who would also be seen as different. But then, aren’t we all? An important understanding, in a political environment that’s increasingly suspicious of difference and seeks to demonize otherness.

The Law of Truly Large Numbers - Oct 3 2026

 

The Law of Truly Large Numbers

Oct 3 2026

If The Law of Truly Large Numbers is true

then anything is possible

if you count high enough.

But mom, all my friends are doing it

a teenager whines,

and why not cheat on my taxes

doesn’t everyone?

Enough scofflaws, it seems

and nothing’s impossible.

Of course, most of us aren’t statisticians.

When unlikely things happen

we’re alone in the world,

feel a spotlight

following us

like an unblinking eye. 

The hard geometry of reality softens

our firm foundation sags,

and we begin to imagine

some hidden power.

Sure, if you’re good with numbers

you can calculate the odds

a thing might happen

  — but happen to me?!

This is no mere coincidence, I’ll flatly insist.

And wasn’t it Freud who said

there are no accidents?

Ideally, laws should be precise.

But “truly” large??

This isn’t a law, it’s guesswork.

Like doing your taxes,

when massaging the numbers

or shifting a decimal

one spot to the left

can tempt the best of us.

Still, precise or not, it’s reassuring.

Because if the Law of Truly Large Numbers

really is true

it opens up the universe,

all its unseen galaxies

quadrillions of suns

and undiscovered earths;

an infinity

of possibility

and no false hope.

Actually, quadrillion underestimates the number of stars in the universe by app. 9 orders of magnitude!  I originally had written trillions, liked the sound of quadrillions better (whatever quadrillion is!), then thought it might be high  . . .and checked. A truly large number indeed!

Of course, Freud is mostly full of shit. Sometimes a cigar really is just a cigar! Kudos to him, though, for pioneering the idea of the subconscious. Before him, no one really viewed human behaviour through a psychological lens, as we routinely do now. 

https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/2026/10/strange-power-of-coincidence/688880/?gift=7KKUTeeJruMo0n11oQFrLnz_ZkEXXcTjCj0YBctvYj4

Going Home Again - Oct 2 2026

 

Going Home Again

Oct 2 2026

It’s always smaller than you remember

if it’s even still there.

The postage stamp backyard

your closet-sized room.

You can go home again

but not really. 

And while the big maple is even bigger

you parents shrunk;

the father

who was all-powerful

is now a small old man,

the mother bear

who so fiercely protected her young

has turned into a teddy

with some stuffing leaking out.

But while things diminish

moments loom large.

The crumpled fender,

best friend,

bad job.

The fishing trips

with just the two of you.

First grade, first kiss, first drunk,

first sex

that wasn’t embarrassing. 

The pets

whose deaths can still bring tears,

when the cruel truth

there’s no forever

landed like a betrayal.

Memory works that way.

It’s less a camera, recording in real time

than a poem

you write from the heart.

Then rewrite countless times

because it sounds wrong

goes on too long

or doesn’t matter anymore.

Because you want to make it rhyme

or find a better word.

Or because of something you said,

cutting a difficult line

you felt you had to write

but know could never share.

As more was learned about how memory works, the more it was understood that it isn’t fixed. That every time a memory is called upon — depending on things like mood, state of mind, circumstance,  expectation, and new information — it gets written. And, of course, even a virgin memory — the original version, uncontaminated by recall — is not what happened, it’s what we perceived. Because there’s a big difference between objective reality and what our senses take in, and then what our brain determines should be given salience. Just ask 2 people who witnessed the same event to recall what they saw. Neither version is likely the whole truth! Defence lawyers know this: eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable and easily influenced, perhaps by overhearing someone else’s recounting, or something as simple as a leading question. 

Things are forgettable. But experiences and relationships leave a strong impression. Which is what they say about life. That it won’t be the fancy car or big house you remember on your deathbed, it will be the relationships:  the people and events that won’t fade, and where consolation and meaning might be found. 

I certainly don’t share much. I don’t write confessional poetry. I make stuff up and take poetic license. 

It’s not that I don’t want my reader to see herself in it when she can. But it’s a shared sensibility or an image that strikes a chord, not a spotlight on my life, with all its minor traumas and personal flaws.

In the penultimate stanza, I couldn’t resist goes on too long, even if it doesn’t strictly apply to memory. Because it applies so nicely to the poetry metaphor. Or at least my poems, which usually do. Even though I know better, but still refuse to rewrite. (Unable to cut even a single precious word!)

White Pine - Oct 1 2026

 

White Pine

Oct 1 2026

The massive trunk

of the towering pine

curves gently to the south.

Away

from the prevailing wind

that blows from west of north.

I imagine how the sapling must have bent

but didn’t break.

As if its supple spine

had a memory.

As if its thick cell walls

had grown under stress

and carried a permanent mark

  —  like an impressionable child 

who learns by example

despite what you tell him.

These virgin white pine, strong and straight

were prized as masts

in His Majesty’s Royal Navy.

So this one must have been spared;

a misfit tree

a freak of nature.

Shunned, like circus people.

The way decent folks gawk

at the bearded lady, fire-eater

lithe contortionist,

who are happy to keep to themselves

in their wheeled caravans

of ornately carved wood.

A tree that learned well,

standing

like a column of granite 

against the fiercest gale.

A beautiful tree,

looming protectively 

and strengthened by adversity.  

I wonder how many ships went down

since this one’s been here?

And a tree I can only admire

if not be proud of;

as if it wasn’t presumptuous 

that simply owning property

entitled me to pride.

No one gawks

or points in ridicule.

We only look up,

and with a hand shading our eyes

take delight;

a survivor

that, like the best of us

bends but doesn’t break.

Squander - Sept 30 2026

 

Squander

Sept 30 2026

Rain, after a dry spell

soaks into the ground

the way a parched man guzzles

whatever foul liquid

you offer him.

It may have poured

come down in torrents

rained cats and dogs,

but there’s no puddling, no mud,

not even a dark blush

to the desiccated soil.

The earth seems bottomless,

its thirst unquenchable.

It percolates down,

finding its way through cracks and seams

and into streams,

then collecting underground 

in great aquifers

where for millennia

it may sit in the dark;

cold still water

with an iron tinge

and the hard taste of rock.

This is like the rich man’s horde

his cache of wealth.

Precious water he can tap

like liquid gold

beneath the desert sand.

Or, like a spendthrift, squander,

pumping it out

until the ground subsides

and his palace crumbles,

the lush green crops

turn into husks

baked brown by the sun.

     ~~~~

  . . . Or a dry spell

when no rain comes.

Cloudless skies,

and parched men 

down on their knees

gazing listlessly up.

Praying to their god

because what else is there to do?

Words, from dry cracked lips

an indifferent god 

has yet to hear.

It rained yesterday, and the turbid puddles on the gravel road were wider than they’ve been since the spring thaw.  I thought back to a dry summer, when a few hours after it rains (even an infrequent heavy rain) there was no sign it even had. The soil just drank it up.

Behind this poem was a critique of short-term thinking: how susceptible we are to immediate gratification; living for today and the hell with tomorrow. As in mining aquifers:  consuming groundwater faster than it can be replenished.  More particularly, though, was the idea of accelerating climate change and our collective heedlessness. When it will be too late for anything but prayer.   . . . Yes, couldn’t once again resist throwing in a barb at religion!

(I was originally tempted to write contempt for religion, but that’s not really how I feel. Maybe contempt for the lack of intellectual rigour in faith-based belief, but not for the understandable need religion fills for people — consolation, community, ritual, and meaning — or contempt toward them. After all, life can be hard. It’s just that for me, I’m more willing to feel bad than believe in stuff someone just made up. 

So believe to your heart’s content. But please don’t take it as license to kill the apostate, forcibly convert the heretic, or make war; to issue self-serving decrees in the name of some god; to ignore science; or to indoctrinate my children while making me join with you in prayer. Freedom from religion as well as freedom of it. 

And I don’t buy the argument that without theology we’d descend into immorality and hedonistic decadence. What about basic humanism? Because you don’t need dogma to live ethically, or fear of hellfire to be good. Goodness for its own sake works better and means more.)

Undone - Sept 29 2026

Undone

Sept 29 2026

The unfinished novel.

The poem that lost its way.

The false starts, on crumpled foolscap

balled-up on the floor.

And the essay

I swear I'll get to soon enough.

A lifetime of good intentions

    . . . and things left undone.

Letters I wish I'd sent,

apologies

that went unsaid,

regrets, I kept to myself.

The love I felt

but never expressed.

Because the time was never right.

Because I feared rejection.

Because I felt unworthy

to even try.

And because it was better to imagine

than let the dream die.

But it did, of course;

she got on with her life

mine stalled.

Like a student who procrastinates

until it's too late

to ask for extra time.

Like the poem

too clever by half

that doesn't have a heart.

And like the novel, in search of an end

that goes off in all directions

until it stammers to a stop.

We regret the things in life we didn’t do more than the bad choices we made and things we actually did.  Because it’s easy to idealize the things we only dream about, while reality is never perfect. The life we didn’t have could always have been better than the one we lived.

Doesn’t every writer have at least 1 unfinished novel mouldering in a desk drawer? Or on a corrupted computer file? (I hasten to say not me:  I have neither a novelistic imagination nor a novelistic life!) And since I hate waste, every false start of a poem gets tortured to a conclusion — no matter how good or bad!

 But aren’t all lives undone? Never fully complete? Never come to a  definitive and satisfying end? I hear of dying people who say they have no regrets. I very much doubt this. Perhaps memory fails. Perhaps they’ve absolved themselves. Or maybe it’s the morphine. I already have lots of them. On my deathbed, they’ll still be there. 

Coming to a stop is not the same as coming to an end. An ending concludes. It reaches its destination, just as a good novel leaves nothing unresolved, no loose threads. While a stop just runs out of gas.

Pulp - Sept 28 2026

 

Pulp

Sept 28 2026



I have distilled my words

down to pure alcohol.

They will intoxicate

merely by proximity;

a whiff, with your eyes closed,

a kiss

with booze on her breath.

And unlike wine

these spirits

aren’t corrupted by age.

No mixers or garnishes.

No spritzers, or umbrella drinks.

Just a shot glass 

of hard liquor

tossed back in one gulp.

Concision, she says,

wielding her red pen

like a scalpel dripping blood.

Embellishment’s for sissies,

while 200 proof

is proof of manliness

  — absinthe

or whisky straight

my editor insists.

And teetotallers?

Ahhh, the abstainers

who claim to be virtuous

and high on life.

Who want to burn the confessions

and self-indulgent memoirs,

long Russian novels

with polysyllabic names.

Torch the sappy romances

with run-on sentences,

sex

too embarrassing to read.

But happily, recite razored poetry

they know by heart

or make up their own.

Then marvel at the trees

instead of turning them to pulp.

I began to write this as an antidote to my usual prolixity. An act of self-discipline. Because I’m my own editor, and apparently not a very good one!

I was determined:  10 lines max. A quickie. Unsurprisingly, I failed.  … On the other hand, I think if every word counts, it passes the test. 

But it came fast. Wrote itself. And — I think — propulsive enough to seem short! Anyway, while distillation is good, who wants 200 proof alcohol? It burns going down, and tastes like disinfectant. 

It’s about concision, yes; cutting the fat. But also — as the last two lines (as well as earlier in high on life) so abruptly clarify — about eliminating the intermediary and interpreter; and instead, living life first hand. Because language is at best a poor metaphor for the real thing.

I always instinctively distrusted poetry that came too easily. But later learned that those are often the best. This one was pure stream of consciousness. A flow state. I began with no idea where it would go: just took dictation, while letting it take me by the hand. ( . . . Actually, most of my poems feel like that!)