Along with my essay on matters of life and death, including suicide, from the perspectives gained on my nearly 10-year-and-counting and never-ending spiritual journey — We Are Only As Sick As Our Secrets Suicide provides no relief at all On ledge imagining end to my pain Pavement streaming toward me will not end fall Just before break solution becomes plain My penance to help others to refrain Thought my loved ones better off without me Truth’s too likely they’ll header into…

You should but first, you need to learn yourself the difference between feelings and emotions — I learned from White Feather that the heart broadcasts and receives transmissions of the highest order and magnitude — pure feelings — feelings unadulterated by emotions. So, yes I should, and I should inspire my kids, to follow their hearts but only once they discern the difference between a feeling…

A rondeau poem inspired by my walk today along country roads — “If a horse is grazing in a field and they come towards you when you are around you can be sure they like you. Horses that follow your movements in their presence show they are focused on and give you 100% of their attention.” — Source Poem Title: Sweet Horse…

A very high-level thinker and scholarly writer on and off Medium, Graham Pemberton, recently did an exhaustive series looking for the original meaning of the first three chapters of Genesis. Here's his summary piece. https://medium.com/@graham-pemberton/what-do-the-first-three-chapters-of-genesis-really-mean-summary-and-concluding-thoughts-9439b97f666d His discussions of Adam and Eve support thoughts of my own that I have had…

A rondeau redoublé poem — There’s no sense in rehearsing tragedy No purpose found in seeking happiness Steel yourself for life of dark comedy For serenity, nakedly undress Live in moderation without duress Third eye sees this divine optometry Upon awakening, soul shall impress There’s no sense in rehearsing tragedy Humans shall lose our grandiosity and…

My streams of consciousness response to version 2 of Jean Carfantan’s divination game — The thoughts expressed below began to flow to me before Jean Carfantan updated his story, Playing Again the Divination Game, Breaking the shell with the inner dice, with question ID: d96e728e-d605–4fdf-95c5–0a8b96a08df2. Did I feel that someone had thought of a question but not revealed it to anyone including Jean, which…

A free verse poem inspired by a picture of a rainbow on September 11th — Experiencing elegiac synchronistic ekphrasia Knowing a poem will emerge from this visual ambrosia Two sprites high-fiving each other in the water right of Queensboro Know that my three eyes will translate this quite thorough What is it about rainbows? Capturing imaginations of creation, as we forget and corrupt the meaning of…

I agree with everything you said here about the benefits of critical thinking and the drawbacks of lazy thinking and I thought your postscript at the end warning anti-religion bigots not to twist your words was spot on. You and I are both not religious and regardless of our beliefs…

A tanka responding to Paper Poetry’s September prompt — Face fear with courage Strength to be vulnerable Embrace letting go Accept unacceptable Now need not last forever Poet’s Notes: Last week my dear friend of about 38 years, Pamela Busch, posted their first Medium story since they last wrote here two years ago. It’s a short and important read: Sometimes, a Kiss is Not Just a Kiss Realizing that #IToo was sexually assaultedpamela-busch.medium.com