Total Views
Poetry and insights
I’m in love with words, and I love to use the right words to create poems that have clarity and character. I think of my work as “literal poetry.” I don’t put my pen down until I’ve said exactly what I feel, exactly what I mean to say, so that you, as the reader or listener, will have no doubt about it. I want to write poems that don’t need to be explained—what you see is what it is. I want to write poems that express deep human emotions, and very thoughtful observations, and very precise meanings. I am a poet, a writer, a teacher, a moralist, a historian and an unflinching student of human nature. I think a lot. I strive to express truth and give context—both rational and emotional—to reality. I think words can be pictures, and lovely songs, and bodacious scents, and private flavors, and early morning caresses that wake each part of me, one at a time. I know some of those words, and, from time to time, I write some of them.
that “frolic architecture”…Emerson quote
sometimes he grabbed the best words
“we won’t be still…”…“motion,” my poem
talk it up
“your quick laugh…”…“a time,” my poem
quiet love
The Book of Days…part lxi
nature poems about the dawn’s early light…
“I bethink a new imagination…”…“Passage,” my poem
humdrum steps
Book Reviews and insights
Reading is part of my life. Old books are companions—they have a palpable essence that will never be duplicated in an eBook reader. I can live with books, inter librorum copias. I don’t read too many novels, although I’m partial to 19th century American and English writers like Dickens and Hawthorne and O. Henry. I’m happy when I’m reading aloud. I wish that I may live long enough to read at least most of the books in my library.
Twice-Told Tales…book review
…baubles of memory from Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Rise of Christianity: A Sociologist Reconsiders History
…humans and their faith, by Rodney Stark (book review)
Golden Tales of New England…book review
Some feel-good stories of the 19th century…
This America…by Jill Lepore, book review
The Case for the Nation
The Greatest Sentence Ever Written…book review
it didn’t come easy
Historical insights
I think it’s difficult to be a sensitive and sensible human being without some knowledge of history and its enduring elements. An insufficient understanding of history is an impediment to decent participation in human society. I am particularly intrigued by the systematic methods of the French Annalistes to examine the deep structures (longues durées) of history. Awareness and understanding of history allow us to create and sustain a mindful context for our past and present adventures.
Eye of the Needle…desperate but human…movie review
living and dying
The Diary of a Lady of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania…book review
hiding in your house…
Goodbye, Darkness: A Memoir of the Pacific War…book review
William Manchester’s nightmare…
Christendom: The Triumph of a Religion, AD 300-1300…book review
Peter Heather tells a new story
With the Old Breed…book review
the prayers of E. B. Sledge, a warfighter
The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business (book review)
no managers in olden times…
Conspiracy…movie review
…a flawless portrayal of naked evil…
The Self-Made Man in America (book review)
Prof. Irvin Wyllie exposes the myth
What It Is Like to Go to War (book review)
Karl Marlantes tells the ugly story
1491 by Charles Mann (book review)
…lost American legacies
Politics: thoughts and insights
Yelling isn’t my style. I am a committed and, I think, well-informed liberal progressive. It’s my intention to avoid presenting any political commentaries that are doctrinaire, abusive, deliberately hateful or contrary to “…a decent respect to the opinions of mankind…” Maybe you’ll recognize those words from the Declaration of Independence. I respect the value and the necessity of dedicated support for the preservation of the public good. I’m willing to offer my considerations of what constitutes the public good.
The Man Who Broke Capitalism (book review)
Jack Welch, all-American what?
Major Problems in the Civil War and Reconstruction (book review)
as they saw it in mid-19th century…
A Magnificent Catastrophe (the 1800 election, book review)
Edward Larson tells the nasty story
The Unknown American Revolution (book review)
in the streets, says Gary Nash
The Urban Crucible, by Gary Nash (book review)
the revolution and the leather-apron crowd…
How the Irish Became White (book review)
another slice of American history by Noel Ignatiev
Book review: The Myths of Tet
How people get killed by lies…
Book review: Shantung Compound
They didn’t care much about each other…
Book review: Forced Founders
Woody Holton explains that Virginia’s “Founding Fathers” had patriotism, and some other stuff, on their minds….
Tidbits
Occasional items that tickle your funny bone, or point your mind in a new direction, or invite you to stop for a moment and listen to what your heart is telling you.
“…make sunshine…”…Louisa May Alcott quote
why not?
“…a sandy cat…”…Virginia Woolf quote
you have to think about the cat
Last Chance Harvey…movie review
heart throbs galore…
“More than coffee…” (my poem)
ask me again, Polly…
not just cookies…my poem
eat the last one
learning to read?…no problem
start writing anyway…
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie…book review
growing up is hard to do
We need both, remembering and forgetting…
The wisdom of the Cherokees
the TV screen won’t stop talking…my poem
I don’t watch TV
News of the World…movie review
not your ordinary Tom Hanks movie