what's new?

I'm busy putting together a big collection

of short stories to be published soon.

setting free the bird

For years I had to look at this thing at work.

When my co-worker retired, she left the bird.

Today I took it into the woods

and gave it freedom.

in the desert

Last weekend, I watched one of my favorite

Charlie Chan films, CASTLE IN THE DESERT (1942)

which reminded me of this chapter

from the autobiography I'm working on:

Castle in the Desert

When I lived in New York

I used to go to an old movie theater,

red as a velvet heart inside 

with lamps on the walls.

I watched My Little Chickadee

with W.C. Fields and Mae West,

The Marx Brothers and Charlie Chan

finding the Castle in the Desert.

Homesick in one of the biggest

cities in the world, I knew

I was ready to leave

when it became my routine to go

to The Museum of Natural History.

Somewhere in all those displays

I would find the great wall of glass

holding a captured recreation of

the Pacific Northwest rain forest,

staring into the green light of

birdsongs, cedars and firs

in the middle of skyscrapers.

I used to have a topsecret way of

sneaking into that amazing museum.

(I won't say how in case someone else

is using the same method.)

Also, I realize now how lucky I was

to grow up seeing all those old films

in movie theaters.

A Week Old Snake Story

Last Monday at this very moment

we were watching a cartoon 

where someone had to face 

their fear of snakes.

Seeing enough

I went into the kitchen 

and there was a garter snake

curled on the floor.

Fearlessly, I got it outside 

using a dustpan and 

a paper bag.

paintings by Rustle and Rosa

Le Havre

just watched Aki Kaurismaki's new movie LE HAVRE

a beautiful dream, like the films of the old masters

a receipt

morning lights

this morning looking across

the valley and the bay to

Mt. Constitution on Orcas Island