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!)

Filling the World with Sound - Sept 26 2026

Filling the World with Sound

Sept 26 2026

I wonder if the dog I hear in the distance

is barking at the echo

he's made himself?

Trapped

in a recursive loop

until his bark gives out.

But at least he doesn't shrink

from expressing himself.

Full-throated, he is fully present,

contained in a circumscribed world

of him

his listener

and their life-and-death feud.

While I keep to myself,

speaking softly

if at all.

Not so much humble, as fearful

 --  because the smaller the target

the harder to hit.

Although I too am caught in a loop

I've made myself,

an echochamber

of agreeable voices

that validate me.

Not to mention

enjoying the sound of my own.

Am I as territorial

as that excitable dog?

Saliva bubbling from its lips

strings of drool dribbling down,

rising up on 2 hind legs

then springing stiffly

on 4 extended ones

flinging flecks of spit?

Like a boxer, who taunts his opponent

by bouncing lightly on the mat,

then beckons

with an upturned fist

as if to say just try me!

Hardly, I admit.

I'm no watchdog, or protector

to-the-last-drop-of-blood,

no fighter

or brawler

at the drop-of-a-glove.

I don't even speak up,

habitually biting my tongue

for fear of giving offence.

More mouse than dog,

I scurry along the baseboards

in a grey blur

I hope goes unnoticed,

emitting rapid-fire squeaks

too high for human ears.

So while the dog prowls its borders

and fills the world with sound

I shrink into mine,

protected by silence

hunkered down out of sight.

One of my dogs was barking incessantly the other day. It’s relatively isolated where I live, so I generally let them: a barking dog won’t bother anyone, and I like to let them have their fun. But this was getting annoying, and when it appeared she was barking at her own echo, I told her to stop. Then wondered if I hadn’t, just how long would she have carried on?!

Today, the neighbour’s dog was going at it, frustrated she couldn’t join my girls who were chasing balls in the lake. I thought how free they must feel compared to me:  while I keep my head down and am acutely aware of making noise that could disturb others, dogs are little solipsists who haven’t any concern about the world outside themselves. They put their whole being into it. There is no restraint. 

 . . .How enviable!

Holding Up the Line - Sept 25 2026

 

Holding Up the Line

Sept 25 2026

I’m somewhere in the middle

as the line behind me builds.

And while annoyed by the wait, I feel a little smug

eyeing the late-comers

who drift in one-by-one.

After all, could always be worse.

We take baby steps,

shuffling ahead

while protecting our personal space

  — as if these were the strangers

our mothers warned us against.

Actually, not even glancing up,

because eye contact 

might risk inviting more.

Although there's always an outgoing sort

who’s irrepressibly chatty.

I have to admit, I wish I could be as happy

as she seems to be,

instead of introverted

taciturn

and too anxious to engage.

Some fidget and stew,

as if to project

how irate they feel.

The type who’d demand to see the manager

if anyone there

was even listening,

if the harried attendant

wasn’t busy enough.

Some stare into screens,

spending time no differently

than they do every day.

I catch a young couple flirting

out the corner of my eye

and feel a little envious.

While an older one has their hands full

corralling restless kids

tempted by the candy bars

and salty snacks,

cleverly placed

at arm's-length

on either side.

Like a diorama, in real-time

of love’s starry-eyed beginning

and its sleep-deprived end.

I stand still

but hardly stoical,

willing the line to move

and stealing glances

to see how far to go.

The groceries

perilously balanced in my hands

are getting heavier,

and as time ticks down, I feel increasingly trapped

in this over heated building

and this claustrophobic line.

How much of life is waiting?

If not in line

then for the one big break,

your one great love,

that mythical time

when all the work is finally done

and you can become

who you were meant to be.

No endless to-do list,

no putting in time.

No bumping up against a stranger

who gives the evil eye.

And no one

like the confused old man

at the self-scanning machine,

looking vacantly for help 

and holding up the line.

Just to clear the record. I am an introvert, but not very shy. (Yes, they’re 2 different things.) And, when I get the chance, hardly taciturn. 

Actually, stuck in a line with strangers I’ll never see again, the anonymity seems to give me permission to be uncharacteristically outgoing. Sometimes, I’ll actually initiate conversation: when I’m in the mood,  just an amusing observation we can easily share. Makes the wait easier. Keeps me occupied. Humanizes what can be an uncomfortable proximity. 

Indeed, a lot of life is waiting. How often are we urged (or urge ourselves) to hurry up, only to end up waiting?

(I think it’s actually called a “self-checkout” machine. But for some reason self-scanning sounded  better.)

Water-Strider - Sept 23 2026

 

Water-Strider

Sept 23 2026

The setting sun

reflected off the still water

smooth as mirrored glass

tinting it a golden red.

I looked out through slitted eyes

blinded by the glare. 

In the the glassy calm

it almost seemed possible

I could walk on water 

as far as I wanted to.

The way water-striders scoot along

and even stand perfectly still,

poised

with their gossamer legs

spread like tiny struts,

each pod

dimpling the polished glass.

An onshore breeze

sent little riffles

skittering over the lake.

A squall touched down

and touched down again,

skipping over the surface

like a smooth flat stone.

It was as if the wind

had become visible.

As if water and air

had conjured together

in a trick of léger de main.

   . . . Where, I wondered

were fire and earth?

A high pressure system

barrelled in from the north

under clear blue sky.

A brisk west wind

funnelled down the narrows

adding speed,

driving white capped waves

and lashing spray from their tips.

But this all from memory

in this ill-tempered winter

gazing out at the snow.

Now, the lake is still,

locked beneath the ice

in its seasonal sleep.

The biting wind

is a distant noise

just as well ignored,

while in the cool stagnant depths

the sun

has been forgotten for months.

All the striders have gone.

But now, I can walk on water

as far as I want.

But plod, not scoot,

and too cold to stop. 

Of course, it’s fall and way too soon for ice. But today, after 2 days of calm — such perfect glass, it looked firm enough to walk on — an onshore breeze from Lake Superior, which is a giant wind machine not far to the south, sent little riffles over our small lake. So I started to think about the various winds we get, and how they initeract with the surface.

As I wrote, the possibility of walking on water stuck with me. So of course, a sharp turn to winter’s ice-covered lake was the obvious ending. And a good way out. Otherwise, the poem would have simply stopped instead of finishing!

Daily Paper - Sept 22 2026

 

Daily Paper

Sept 22 2026

Everyday, like clockwork

I settle into my accustomed chair

in the warm light of my cozy den,

protected

by its four familiar walls.

Where I read about world events,

consequential things

happening faraway

I’m free to take or leave.

The news is relentless;

not a tsunami

where I could at least flee to higher ground,

but wave after wave

getting bigger and bigger

on top of a full moon tide.

A flood I can't wait out,

battering my coastal defences

even on slow news days.

Curiously, my life day-to-day

is much the same as always,

and the stillness here

in my quiet solitude

leaves the headlines feeling unreal.

Or real enough,

but still the same old noise;

like the animal sounds you hear out the door

on cold dark nights

that amount to nothing

when the morning sun returns.

But still, I follow the news

make my judgements.

Is this merely force of habit

I find hard to break?

A creature of routine

set in his ways

who finds comfort there;

like a workhorse

plodding along

ploughing the same old furrow.

Is it the example my parents set?

Back when people with ink-stained fingers

actually read

and trusted the press?

When after work

my father would commandeer his armchair

and disappear behind the paper, 

when on Saturdays

discarded broadsheets

would litter the wood-panelled den.

Or do I simply feel obliged

as a good citizen

to stay informed?

As if I wasn’t powerless.

As if my opinion mattered.

As if there’d be a test.

As if the four walls

enclosing this cozy room

really were the refuge I imagine.

My island of safety

my hardened redoubt.

My higher ground

against a rising sea

as the land recedes

and a faraway world comes crowding in to shore;

weary people

who are hungry and wet

loudly demanding their share.

I still read the daily newspaper I read in my adolescence. Which, believe it or not, is still being published and still doing well. (Yes, I was either precocious, or just a socially awkward teen!) And I still call it the “paper”, even though for years I've been reading it on a screen. …Do people still say “dial” a phone or “spin” a tune?

Hot black coffee and the news. 

But as I get older, I have to admit I care less and less, feel less engaged. Probably just worn out by the relentless sturm und drang. Trump hasn’t helped:  a daily diet of outrage and incredulity sure takes its toll. Or perhaps just consoled I’ll be mercifully dead by the time it all comes crashing down. Doesn’t make a difference how, whether it’s by climate change, geopolitical instability, natural disaster, nuclear war, pandemic, social inequality, or general human stupidity. My bet is it won’t be just one!