THE RESTLESS KIND

I can feel a certain excitement in my veins as I contemplate the next trip.  This time, I will be better prepared.  I will bring my tennis shoes, because I will be doing lots of walking. I will bring my sweater, which I forgot the last time I headed for the Rockey Mountains.  I will bring the monocular that allows me to read street signs, because, in Fort Collins, the signs are either small, hang out over the intersections, or both.   I have 31 days to prepare for this trip, whereas the last time, which was truly an impulse journey (and the partial fulfillment of a lifelong dream) came together in just two.  

Where my last trip experience occurred on the hinge of spring and winter, this escape will take place after the official beginning of fall.  I know to expect he unexpected when it comes to weather.  Will I arrive in Indian summer, warm and beautiful, or will there be rainstorms that share the days?

I have been a restless traveler since I was a child.  On one family weekend, visiting friends in San Diego, I remember walking on a county road in a rural area, and getting perhaps a hundred feet ahead of my parents.  I loved climbing the hills, moving quickly, then taking my time as I descended. I never wanted it to stop.

I was seventeen when the gypsy bug truly bit me.  Sitting at home one afternoon, a friend of mine called me on my new phone.

"Ishmael and I are going to Las Vegas tonight.  Do you want to come?"

I talked to my parents.  They weren't sure they wanted their blind teenager to go running off to Vegas, but at least I wouldn't be alone.  My friends, Louis and Ishmael would be there.  Louis was eighteen, and his brother, sixteen.

Another concern was money. I had a bank account, and I had some money.  How much would I need?  How long would we be gone?  After a couple more quick phone calls, some negotiation between us would-be gypsies, we decided we would go for just the day.  That first trip would last about thirty hours.

Permission was granted.

Midnight found us at the Greyhound station, waiting excitedly for our bus to arrive.  I remember being surprised at how many people surrounded us.  Some were heading south toward Mexico.  Some were heading north to the central valley and beyond.  But there was also a core group of us waiting to head east.

We arrived in Las Vegas about time for breakfast. None of us were legally allowed into the casinos to play the slots, but sticking together, we managed to stay clear of casino security as we dropped nickels, quarters, dollars into various slot machines.

Ishmael, the youngest of the group, was the lucky one, hitting a four-hundred-dollar jackpot on a quarter slot before lunch.  Meanwhile, Louis and I kept playing, drinking all the free soda the casinos would provide us. We even had a couple alcoholic drinks during that day.

The bus that would take us home was scheduled for midnight. When we weren't gambling, we ventured out into the summer heat to explore the city on foot.  We managed to explore several casinos during our eighteen-hour foray into a life we weren't yet old enough to legally partake.

By eleven that night, exhausted, yet still running on the excitement of what we were doing, we made our way back to the bus station.  There would be about six hours to catch up on any sleep.  For the moment we just swapped stories of things that we had seen and done.

Arriving back in Los Angeles at dawn on Sunday morning, we boarded a metro bus and headed back home.

There would be two more trips to Vegas that year: one with the three of us, the last with just Louis and me.  By then, we had found the city enticing enough to get a hotel room where we could crash, thus extending the weekend from just a day-trip to a weekend.  On none of these trips did I ever come out ahead monetarily.  

Three Greyhound trips in the span of about four months, and the gypsy bug was definitely in me.  I began to dream about taking a longer trip, perhaps a cross-country trip.  I would stop in various places.  

As a kid, I had gone on several family vacations that involved long car trips.  My family had driven to Baja Mexico one year, and to Vancouver Canada another.  Another year, we drove around the country visiting aunts and uncles and cousins: Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, then Georgia.  From Georgia we visited more family in South Carolina, then drove through North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee.  Eventually, we reached Illinois, where the bulk of my maternal relatives were living at the time.  

Leaving Illinois, we moved through Wisconsin and Minnesota, visiting even more extended family, before  beginning the homeward leg.  South Dakota, Wyoming,  Utah, Nevada, and eventually we made our way back to Los Angeles.

Future family travels would be shorter, as my siblings and I grew older.  We went to New Mexico one year.  The next, we went to Colorado.  These trips were necessitated by the movement of my older siblings, and they opened my eyes to areas of the country I had not seen, or had passed through on the way to somewhere else.  

Fast forward now to 1989.  At twenty-six, working in my first job, earning my own money, I decided one Thursday afternoon that I wanted to go away for the weekend.  After a couple quick phone calls from my desk on my lunch break, I was ready.

I arrived at work that Friday morning with just a small backpack containing two days' worth of clothes.  When a coworker asked me about my plans for the weekend, I told her I was going to San Diego.

"So you have to go home and pack?"

"No."  I gestured at the backpack.  "I'm leaving straight from here.  I'm walking over to Union Station at four-fifteen."

She didn't believe me.  

At four-fifteen, we walked out of the court together.  She headed for the bus stop to go home, and I headed around the corner and on my two-block walk to catch a train.

I never quite bought into the American Dream.  Owning a home has never held any appeal for me.  Even after I married, and started a family, the idea of laying down roots was foreign to me.  I thought I would change if and when I found the place where I wanted to stay permanently.

Before we married, Chris and I had talked about relocating.  She didn't like (more truthfully, she hated) Los Angeles, and made me promise we would relocate as soon as a job could be found closer to northern California and her family.  That wouldn't happen for five years, and would involve an earthquake, stairs leading to the apartment being torn from the wall, and a fortuitous phone call.

I had let my boss know I was interested in transferring.  She must have said something to one of her colleagues, because two days after the ground had begun moving, I got a phone call.

"How would you  like to come to San Francisco?"

A month later, I walked into the San Francisco office.  I would be there for the next twelve years.

Where Chris never made a secret of her desire to put down roots, I've never hidden my gypsy impulses.  The competing dreams eventually led to separation.  Whatever our similarities, our shared faith, our love for our daughter, it wasn't enough to keep us bound.  Just short of eleven years, we separated.

One of my long-term dreams is to set foot on all seven continents.  For now though, I'll settle for exploring the continental United States, on bus when I can, on foot whenever possible, by train when I have the time, by plane when I don't

(To be continued)

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author.

HONEY

At roughly the same time each day

the barking begins, the call to play.

Anyone can answer, go outside,

grab a ball--any ball will do--

in Honey's mind.  There is only play.

Knowing to the inch how far to throw

the ball, how high to bounce against

the wall, the metal door of the garage,

off the dog-house, the picnic table.

I change the trajectory, forcing 

Honey to watch my hands. When the ball leaves

me behind, she jumps, she runs--sometimes she catches,

sometimes the orange and blue orb

eludes her, skitters into bushes,

drops magically into the water bowl.

(Two points, please!) 

We can do this for hours. Honey never tires,

it seems. Her focus, her enthusiasm

never flags. With ball in hand,

I have her full attention.

 If only she obeyed when no ball

was in sight. at least, for now,

she sits, she waits patiently,

trusting that I'll throw the ball.

Yellow whirlwind, tail wagging,

Honey throws her whole being

into whatever the game might be.

And when I lose track, Honey confidently

hunts under and around any obstacles

just to keep the game going.  She knows

my blindness.  when I bend,  hands on

knees, she knows to stop running in circles

and brings me the ball.

and I know, by the sound of her breathing,

the time she takes to retrieve the ball,

when her energy is almost spent.

I say,"I'm done." And Honey heads inside

without protest.  Maybe she thinks

later we can play some more.

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author

WATER FUTURES

WATER FUTURES

Day One

Water futures soaring

Overhead,

Denying baptism to thirsty,

Fire-prone land,

Tempting with humid, undrinkable

Air

As the currents carry the promise

Further east, perhaps to flush

Out the desert dust

And leave the citizens' tongues parched

Again. 

Wildfires rage, race through fuels

Created by prolonged water-denial.

Some wish,

Some pray,

Some dance

To satisfy a need

Overlooked in el nino's visitations. 

Pages turn, orbit continues, 

Rotation remains constant, 

All things in their time;

This includes elusive rain.

Meanwhile,

Manzanita and chaparral,

Wild grass, now bone-dry,

Vulnerable to careless people,

Carefree lightning.

And water futures I won't place

My money on are floating

Overhead, just out of reach.

Day Two

The clouds of offering are gone,

Sent onward, by the winds,

Heading in the wrong direction

In this poet's opinion,

To do any good. Perhaps

There is concurrent need

Not yet known,

The ounce of prevention

Against ten thousand gallons of 

Cure.

The skies, with small dots of

Clouds now let the heat

Escape in infrared waves

Heading upward and outward,

This dry, end of summer ritual

Just another of the dances

We, here on the surface, never

Truly comprehending,

Must powerlessly observe,

Ever hopeful, ever wishing,

For the chill wind.  Only then,

We wish back the warmth

Of summer fled.

Summer holds its place

Until its sands, too,

Have vanished from

The hourglass.

And still, we dream of

Water.

The firefighters wish for home,

Their  soft beds and

The beautiful riot

Of normal.

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author

THE CAT

THE CAT

There are, I've found, two ways to center myself: put a baby in my arms, or a cat in my lap.  In the early years of dealing with depression, and before the self-injury began, I adopted a cat from another person in therapy.  I had mentioned to her that I wanted to do this, but wanted to wait until my daughter could participate. One day, after we were through with groups and individual therapies, she asked me if I would be interested in taking her cat, Princess.  It seems she and her husband had a dog, a boxer, who was tormenting the cat, and they wanted to find her a good home.

The night Michelle and Princess came, we talked awhile.  Michelle had come straight from the vet's office, updating Princess's shots.  

Princess must have known that she was going to a new home, and didn't like it much.  When freed from her carrier,she tore down my short hallway and into the bathroom.  Here, she climbed the shower curtain and brought it clattering down to the floor.  From there she headed for the only open door she could find, which led to my bedroom, and from there, into my closet.  We (Michelle and I) tried to talk her out.  I think we even tried to bribe her with food, but no deal.  Princess was in her safe place and wouldn't budge.

It took at least a week before I could coax her from her hiding place in the corner of the closet.  I would leave the apartment each day having set out her food and water, and by the time I returned later, from work or therapy, the food would be gone, and the water seriously depleted.

As treatments continued, I would return home and head straight for the closet.  I would kneel down and reach in to pet the scared cat, talk to her,and assure her no one would hurt her.  Eventually she ventured out while I was doing chores one afternoon without any cajoling from me.

A routine began to develop.  When I got home, I would grab my tape-player and a book, grab the cordless phone, a soda and a snack, then sit down on the couch.  Once I sat down, Princess claimed my lap, stretching out and treating me to prolonged purring.  Provided that I didn't have to move, I could count on at least 30 minutes of lap time, some times longer.  I would pet her as long as she permitted.  She would let me know, by repositioning, by a gentle nudge, or kneading of my leg, that I was to stop.

Five years ago, I had to put Princess down.  She had caught leukemia via a scratch from another animal at some time and had gotten progressively sicker until she barely moved.  

Now there is another cat.  In fact, at one time, there were three before Princess died. But now there is only one, and he, too, demands lap time.  We just had about 20 minutes of it, giving me time to think (or not) about other things Mostly, I just sat, one hand near his tummy, the other just beyond one paw.  When Olie, my sister's 12-year-old tabby, was done with this particular nap, he gracefully rose, then jumped from my lap to find another napping spot. 

And so, I can get on with my day.

MY BIBLIOGRAPHY

A LIFETIME BIBLIOGRAPHY has its origins in my junior year of high school.  In the fall semester I enrolled in two English classes: American Literature (required) and Creative Writing.  I looked forward to the second as it was the first creative writing class I had taken thus far.  As for theAmerican Literature, I had no expectations.  It was, after all, required.  I had no way of knowing that the combination of these two  classes would put me on a path, setting off a lifelong obsession.

First period was American Literature.  (I remember this because of an event I reserve for another time.)  Mr. Rosemond was the teacher.  That first day, he passed out the syllabus, with a list of the books we would be reading for the semester.  There, I found Nathaniel Hawthorn, Mark Twain, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway and F. Scot  Fitzgerald.  (There may have been more, but at this distance, I don't remember them all.  These were the authors we would be discussing over the next twenty weeks.

Next, Mr. Rosemond brought up the subject of the term paper.  We could, he informed us, choose to explore a literary theme, a specific book, or the collected works of an author.  He gave us a couple days to decide which track we would follow.  Of course, we would have to run it by him first, but then we were on our own.

Meanwhile, in Creative Writing, that first day, Mrs. Sternlicht went through much the same first day ritual.  She told us about the schedule--how frequently the stories would be due, the assorted in-class assignments, and her grading policy.

"I want to strongly suggest," she said at some point, "that you start keeping a record of the books that you read.  Reading different authors, getting exposure to different styles, different voices, is how you'll improve your own writing.  Furthermore," she added, "when you get to college, you'll be able to show your professors what you've already read."

The first generation of what became LIFETIME BIBLIOGRAPHY was maintained in braille on 8-1/2x11 paper and kept in a notebook.  I had already found a love of reading before the eleventh grade, so there were titles I could already enter into this logue.  Most were children's books, but not all.  I read, for the first time when I was twelve, Leo Tolstoy's ANNA KARENINA.  

Back in American Literature, I-proposed John Steinbeck's major works as my term project, and Mr. Rosemond agreed.

Over the next twenty weeks, reading and writing, I fell in love with John Steinbeck's books.  THE GRAPES OF WRATH, EAST OF EDEN, OF MICE AND MEN, IN DUBIOUS BATTLE, TORTILLA FLAT, CUP OF GOLD--I read them hungrily, along with the assigned readings already mentioned.  One by one, the bibliography grew.  By semester's end, the notebook where I kept the list of reading accomplishments was filling out quite nicely.  (Only later did I receive, and devour, WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT and THE RED PONY)  

Spring meant switching from reading literature to Expository Composition.  Here, too, there were authors and titles to add to the notebook: these, however, were mostly nonfiction: essay collections, books on grammar and other writing tools and guidelines. 

And then came summer--a time when I was free to read whatever I wanted without any input from teachers.

As mentioned before, the original bibliography was written down in braille.  I am legally (but not totally) blind. I was born with hydrocephalus.  This led to the loss of all vision in my right eye and minimal vision in my left.  I began reading braille when I was four.  When I entered kindergarten, teachers decided to teach me braille rather than print, presuming that my residual vision was too weak to allow me to read large print.  Just two years before the bibliography originated, I had begun to teach myself how to read print, and could slowly read typed letters.  That same year, a special education teacher had been surprised to learn that I couldn't even sign my name, and had set out on a mission to fix that.  She had my name engraved in pressed wood so that I could learn to trace the letters of my name.  To this day, my signature is hardly legible.

The years passed, and the bibliography kept growing.  Initially, in college, I was a business administration major, but I didn't want to add textbooks to the logue I was keeping, so most of the entries from that part of my life were fiction, read after homework was done, on breaks, over summer vacations.    

In the summer of 1982 I started a separate logue with the intent of seeing just how many books I read over the break.  The answer to that was twenty.   On that list were several titles by Danielle Steel and Robert Ludlum, but also included were a couple works of Shakespeare, as well as other plays. 

When I told the person I was dating at the time, the response was: "You could have spent more time with me."  

I just laughed.

Up to this point, all entries were written in braille. Between 1977 and 1984 I alternated between notebooks and index cards.  Notebooks were more portable.  Index cards were more flexible.  With each new author and/or title, I would have to find the corresponding page, rewrite it, inserting the newest achievement in its proper place.  On the other hand, index cards were much easier to change, were smaller, and sometimes got misplaced, or damaged.

After seventeen years of continuous schooling, I convinced the Department of Rehabilitation, as well as my parents, to permit me a one-semester sabbatical from college.  for the next nine months I read, and read, and red.  Seventy-six books (averaging two books per week) I returned to class, changed my major from business administration to English, and got on with my pursuit of a degree.

1985 was the year I took the technological leap.  I bought an Apple IIe and painstakingly created the first of what turned out to be many bibliography files.  While I could now more easily update author and title entries, I ran into repeated occasions where the file was accidentally deleted, or the computer would crash, leaving me to start almost from scratch. (I still had the boxes of index cards from which to resurrect the bibliography.  This was the cycle I would repeat over and over from 1985 until 1994.

In 1986, in another creative writing class (my first at college level) the professor passed out to us students a list of recommended reading.  It wasn't, he explained, something he expected us to complete by the end of the semester.  Instead, it was something we should work on for the rest of our lives.  Three pages in length, it was a list of authors, with some specific titles, that we might read.

  Some of the authors and titles were already familiar to me, but most of them were unknown.  I set out to read as many of them as I could.

Let me stop here for a minute to explain some rules I have imposed, and some personal foibles.  First, a foible: if an author fails to grab hold of my attention within the first thirty pages or so (side one of an audiocassette, say) then I hit the STOP button and send the book back to the lending library.  Life is too short to read something that bores me.  

The first rule I imposed on myself around this time (1986) was that I would not include textbooks in my bibliography.  By this time, nine years into the life of the project, textbooks would  have comprised a sizable portion of the space.  Only after I graduated, and realized that some of those textbooks were actually enjoyable and would have otherwise been included, did I bend the rule

The second rule I imposed was to add only entries where I had read the entire book.  Unless I had enjoyed the entire book, I didn't write it down.  This, too, got amended due to my love of poetry and short stories.  I may not enjoy every story or poem in a given collection, but I read the book otherwise in its entirety.

So far, my reading had taken place through the media of braille, cassettes, even the original version of talking books on vinyl records.  In college though, I got a job working in the university library.  During quiet periods, before and after my shifts, I browsed the stacks.  My vision is such that small books are easier to read to completion.  This led me to explore drama and poetry predominantly.  With a new book in hand, plucked from the PR or PS shelves, I would make my way back to the Fine Arts Desk and resume my post as student librarian.  If the book caught my attention, at shift's end I would make my way downstairs to the circulation desk and check it out.  If not, it went back on the shelf where it belonged.  

This random reading opened my eyes to writers I had never heard of, whose books weren't always available from the National Library Service.  Karen Lindsey, Robert Sherwood, Francesco Petraca are a few of the names I remember from this two year interval with whom I became familiar. 

Along with the RECOMMENDED READING  assigned by Professor Jim Krusoe, I started reading from the Washington Post Book World.  Not only did I write down the authors and titles of the books reviewed there, I also read books by the reviewers as well.  This turned a three-page list into something that grew explosively, opening my eyes to even more writers, styles, subject, and voices.

As an English major, I was simultaneously taking classes in American and British literature.  I remember taking British literature in reverse chronological order: first modern literature, then nineteenth-century, then eighteenth, and so on. Not only did this add to my bibliography, but it also helped me to see the impact of different traditions more clearly, changes in culture, evolution of themes and styles

On January 17, 1994, my faithful Apple IIe died a quick but painful death when the Northridge earthquake threw it from my desk to the floor with a Richter scale 6.8 shove.  For nine years the computer had been where I wrote my stories and maintained my reading histories.  Again, with the help of old fashioned index cards, I would have to reconstruct a computer record.  This time, it would be via a PC.

And so the cycle continues.  Nowadays I sometimes enter new authors and titles before I've completed a book, so excited am I to put down evidence of a new literary find.

As I write this, the bibliography or logue is approaching thirty-three years of existence, and is, in some way, an autobiography.  Perhaps I could have chosen to maintain this reading record in chronological, rather than alphabetical, order.  Then I would see the intellectual progression, mental and emotional development.   (One would notice when my daughter was born by the avalanche of children's books to be entered into the logue.  and the inclusion of psychology-related titles would announce my abortive attempt to pursue a naster's degree in psychology, a pursuit of an MFT license.  Later, it would show the addition of books on legal themes as I pursued, successfully, my paralegal certificate.) But that would most likely have led to something so unwieldy  that I'd have given up on it years ago..  Better, perhaps, that I followed this instinct.  Even alphabetically organized, it fills more pages than years of existence.  I manage to add roughly one page of authors and titles for each year of life.  That adds up to anywhere between thirty and sixty books per year..

Books have accompanied me on many a bus or train ride or airplane flight.  They have helped me pass time in countless waiting rooms over the last three decades..  

I wonder if Mrs. Sternlicht's suggestion lit a fire in other students.

Did they start a record of their reading?

Did they maintain it, or give up after college?

Am I the only one for whom it became an addiction, an automatic reaction to finding good books to read?

As it grows to its current length of thirty-eight pages, the bibliography demonstrates that I continue to be curious about many different things: psychology, law, history, drama, cultures worldwide.  

As long as I breathe, I will read.

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author

COUNTING BACKWARDS

THE COST OF CALIFORNIA

as soon as

the ground begins

moving underfoot,

when windows rattle,

doors start to swing--

closed, open, closed again,

possessions move of

their own free will

with the slightest

encouragement

from their place

of safety 

toward falling,

flying,

desks become caves

under or behind

which to hide,

the world rises

then swiftly falls

away,

up and down,

here or there,

inside or outside

becomes irrelevant,

all that remains

is the motion--

when will it ever end--

clocks keep ticking,

digits on cell phones

keep rolling over

and over and over

in LED progression.

glass just shatters,

car alarms keep shrilling,

motion without emotion,

unpremeditated

until

it just

stops--

again, without

reason.

Laws of motion,

laws of gravity--

objects in motion

stay in motion.

Possessions--

unless lighter than air--

must fall:

Newton's law of gravity dictating

terms again.

is it your first,

or just your

latest involuntary

transit across

(or through?)

terror

without an OFF switch?

stasis, having returned,

draws us out

to the ragged edge

of normal

to reoccupy

compassion, concern

for others.

is anyone hurt?

Is anybody bleeding?

Do you smell gas?

Why the metallic

taste?.

only then do you 

know you bit your tongue.

reaching for the radio,

you seek out 

the estimate of damage,

the cost,

architectural,

human.

which is greater?

epicenter?

Information, please.

THE COAST OF CALIFORNIA

as soon as

the ground begins

moving underfoot,

when windows rattle,

doors start to swing--

closed, open, closed again,

possessions move of

their own free will

with the slightest

encouragement

from their place

of safety 

toward falling,

flying,

desks become caves

under or behind

which to hide,

the world rises

then swiftly falls

away,

up and down,

here or there,

inside or outside

becomes irrelevant,

all that remains

is the motion--

when will it ever end--

clocks keep ticking,

digits on cell phones

keep rolling over

and over and over

in LED progression.

glass just shatters,

car alarms keep shrilling,

motion without emotion,

unpremeditated

until

it just

stops--

again, without

reason.

Laws of motion,

laws of gravity--

objects in motion

stay in motion.

Possessions--

unless lighter than air--

must fall:

Newton's law of gravity dictating

terms again.

is it your first,

or just your

latest involuntary

transit across

(or through?)

terror

without an OFF switch?

stasis, having returned,

draws us out

to the ragged edge

of normal

to reoccupy

compassion, concern

for others.

is anyone hurt?

Is anybody bleeding?

Do you smell gas?

Why the metallic

taste?.

only then do you 

know you bit your tongue.

reaching for the radio,

you seek out 

the estimate of damage,

the cost,

architectural,

human.

which is greater?

epicenter?

Information, please.

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author

FRIENDSHIP

How many friends do you have?

Now, how many people would you lay down your life for>

These are the questions that a professor raised in 1985 in Chicano Studies.

Initially, the answers from us students were all over the place.  Three, four, ten.  One classmate said a hundred.

When the second question was asked, suddenly the answers became more and more conservative.

"If you have one friend, by this standard, you're lucky.  If you have two or more, you are truly blessed.

He went on to explain that in certain cultures, like the chicano community, friendships were as highly valued as family connections.  The only difference: we can choose our friends.

At that time, my answer was two, and both of them were people I had grown up with from at least kindergarten.  The number has fluctuated, sometimes as small as one, other times as great as four.

One lesson I've learned is that it doesn't have to be reciprocal.  Sometimes, someone is  so special,for a reason or a season as I've heard it expressed.  I know who these people are in my life.  What I don't know, and we may never know until our back is against a wall, is who will go the distance for us.  The answer is usually surprising.

Do I tell them that they are special, that I would lay down my life for them?  Sometimes that knowledge can come across as frightening, as if I'm requiring that commitment in return;  but I'm not, and I don't.  

At present, there are two people in my life that fit this description, and both of them know.  For one, he has never put it to the test, nor even asked for more than assistance after a medical procedure.  As for the other, the revelation has put some distance between us at this time, though I hope that isn't permanent.  (She will always know how to find me if that need should ever arise.)  

So, as the professor put it 28 years ago:

"How many friends do you have?"

"How many people would you risk your life for?"

Something to think about today.

THE WRITER AS THIEF

In blindness there is sound.

In sound there is reverberation.

In reverberation I find direction.

The sound of cars stopping,

            Passing me by--

In the cacophony of voices,

Words and phrases disconnected

From all the traffic of tongues,

Stories surrounding me.

            Some are lies.

            Some are true.

It's not up to me to discern

Which is which?

I just capture them,

Preserving them for

A future page,

A line fragment.

Wherever a string of words

Tangles in my mind,

Snagging my elusive attention,

There will, someday soon,

Be a place for these transient

Residents to leap into

Someone else's life.

Beware the silent passerby:

She's observing you,

Taking notes--

She's stealing from you

And you don't even know it.

Copyright (c) 2013 by the author