Death Sentence

Saw the doc
again today.
Despite all that exercise
my Chi isn’t as strong
as it was last year

and will continue
to decline
even if I take
the latest drug —
just not as fast.

At that rate
I should run out
of dollars
before I run
out of breath.

Knowing it
couldn’t be denied,
I stopped at Pao’s
and got two
chocolate-raised.

If I’m going
on a long trip,
damn well
going to start it
on a full stomach.

Better than Gold

Every time I walk through a deep forest in the spring and see sunlight reflected off newly formed leaves

Spring Leaves In Sunshine

I’m reminded of Frost’s

NOTHING GOLD CAN STAY

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

even though I realize that the poem refers to the golden buds that emerge just before they turn to leaves, not to newly-formed leaves like these.

Still, the poem captures the Japanese idea of mono no aware as well as any American poem I’m aware of.

Oh, That’s Just Too Cute

If you follow this site at all, you probably realize that I’ve spent a lot more time outdoors than I have inside reading since the sunshine returned, at least until tomorrow. Unfortunately, much of that time has been spent working in the yard.

Fortunately, the rest of it has been spent out walking. Sunday was no exception. We spent the day at Theler Wetlands in Belfair.

I got a few bird shots and some shots of plants, but just to prove I’m not beyond an appeal to blatant sentimentality to boost readership, I thought I’d resort to two shots of fawns with their mommy that Leslie pointed out to me while I was fixated on getting pictures of a Spotted Towhee.

Here’s the first shot:

Deer with two fawns

And here’s a better, second shot.

Deer with two fawns

Of course, when I took the second shot I actually thought there was only one fawn in the shot because I didn’t see the one hiding under the mom. Thank goodness for cheap, digital “film.”

As Clear as Mud

Man Piaba

Sure didn’t know it then, shouldn’t admit it now,
but I probably learned everything I know about love
way back in 4th grade when I fell in love with the most
beautiful girl in the whole wide world, or so she seemed.

Being boys who’d just read Tom and Huck’s adventures,
we used to pester the girls something awful on their way
to school, just knowing they loved all that attention,
though most the time they seemed to pay us no mind.

But Judy won my heart the day she hit my left thumb
square on with her Roy Rogers—Dale Evans lunchbox
so hard I still felt my heart pulsing three three days later,
and the whole summer every time I caught a fastball.

Seemed a sure sign she loved me, though she never said so.
Shoot, everyone knows if you love somebody enough
they have to love you back. Otherwise a guy’d be
near outta his mind to ever go falling in love with one.

Guess I didn’t learn better ‘til our class took up folk dancing
and the day our teacher decreed Lady’s Choice.
We stood cross the room, hugging the wall as best we could
feelin’ near naked and the girls smiling at us not so sweetly.

As I stood there, worrying my sweaty palms
might reveal my true feelings, Judy walked right
past my thump, thumping heart and looked
straight into the eyes of my best friend John.

Maybe I should’ve taken some small consolation
when it turned out little Sarah had a crush on me,
me being the teacher’s pet and all just ‘cuz I could read a little
and her having written a fairy tale for some children’s magazine,
but it really didn’t help none then, and it still don’t.