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This summer, I began working my way through Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Travelled. Yes, Jeeves has written a wonderful book on the mechanics of prosody. At the end of each section, Fry provides a writing exercise. In these early chapters, Fry is clear to say that “verbal or metaphysical brilliance” is not the goal. …

I’ve been trying to put together some kind of fancy schmancy wrap up for the November Poem A Day project, but I’m busy and fried. Obviously the daily posting of the poetry being generated fizzled. I’m not terribly concerned about that. In the end, I generated over 20 poems and fragments that I can possibly …

NPAD 2008 has not died an ignoble death. I was out of town working for ETS, and between the internets not always being right close, actually working hard all day, good dinner conversations, and avoiding doing my day job work, I simply didn’t have time to post. However, I was scribbling away all weekend. Hoping …

On NPAD That feeling when you open up the bath Room door expecting an empty room But find instead your guests arrived and You clothed only with a broom, Or when you’re working hard away to cook A complex, untried recipe, And family members mumble, over-cautious, Doubts of your sobriety, Is nothing weighed against the …

the poem for day 9– a rumination fundamental about a grumpy prophet’s constitution– will, when ready, be posted in its entirety in this bland space reserved for its posterity

Miller’s Crossing The smallest of crackles halted my walk. Things twitched beyond the tree wall Off the path through the twigs two eyes then four Pinned me to ground. Like some opitical Puzzle, my brain slowly decoding, the Shapes in the forest became two white Tailed deer. One minute. Three minutes. Seven minutes in, a …

Ohio Nature Preserve Rising out of a level farmland desert, An oasis: trees, creek, a path. Asphalt manufactured outside of town, A train from Baltimore rumbling past, Footbridge from Alabama fashioned from Pennsylvania steel. Gravel, chalky White shards of limestone quarried nowhere Near here, compacted by mechanized thumpers Purchased from Mr. Smith-Jones on the other …

Found Haiku Ohio Buckeye Twigs emit a foul odor When broken Original source material found in A Field Guide to Eastern Trees: Eastern United States and Canada by George A. Petrides, 1988.

Cure for Warts Bread soda fig trees stolen meat Rotting onions corn kernels rain Dripping from a house knotted string Tossed over left shoulder standing On a bayou bridge moonlit night Dirty dishrags a cross scratched tree Backwards said prayers over numbered Peach pits unbidden neighbor Caterwauling in a darkened Cemetery plot

Essays in the craft Scattered leaves strewn on the lawn Browns and oranges, red highlighted yellow, Dessicated husks discarded Left to decay, nutrition for next year’s growth. Signs of perfection. Tracings gone to nowhere. Faltering logic flowed from simple footings. Well-trod pathways taken again and again Novel paths petering out in too few steps. False …