Category Archives: Uncategorized

These smoking days, sullen, but with birdsong, Since yesterday, left a hope and a disappointment As usual–enough magic to keep you hoping, Enough to disappoint, and Drive your sorrows deeper. The end we know; but whether it comes with a … Continue reading →

Dear Editor, I am eight years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in Flagpole, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth: Is there a Santa Claus? Virginia, Your dad is right … Continue reading →

I know these sweet smells won’t last— I don’t even know where they come from. Sorrows mount; I wake and cry them off, Work another day, some better than others.  If I didn’t think things will change, Well.  These struggles … Continue reading →

Daddy loved you most easily, you two were so alike, an easy friendship grew. But life has a way… One day, the preacher came to our house. 
“Your brother’s been hurt,” he told me, “real bad.” A few minutes later … Continue reading →

A man looks at himself in the mirror; but there is no mirror. He sees himself in his father, His opponent, his friend —what is it he wants? The cat sees her reflection, and jumps into the water after it… … Continue reading →

We forget about the magic in this world, the blooming flowers, As we tread upon dirt that once was stars… Our very eyes are miracles—never mind the things we see: Burials, lightning on the beach, the age of trees, the … Continue reading →

Mary (my sister) and I just back from the ‘burbs of New Jersey west of Manhattan where we staged a four-day multimedia event alternating living-room talks about family history/geneology, jokes about Italians (Jennifer’s husband Robert Romano plays a rather easy-going … Continue reading →

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot … Continue reading →

Remembering The End Of Racial Segregation Originally published in Flagpole Magazine When I started school outside Atlanta, I had some of the very same teachers who had taught my father years before, in the same oiled-floor buildings. Jonesboro was a … Continue reading →

When The El Dorado Was The Only Place To Go For Fresh Food Originally published in Flagpole Magazine My great-grandfather is supposed to have said that he’d just as soon open his mouth and let the sun shine down his … Continue reading →