UN-NAMED

We have not met, but you are not a stranger to me I’ve been hungry and cold Like you are now I have been homeless  And slept in the rough I have been penniless And know how that feels I have been filthy dirty And washed in gas station bathrooms I have bled onto folded…

THERMALITO

No one heard her slip  the undertow was invisible Drifting, her gaze turned inward  silently pulling her downward There was no fear only the beauty  of weightlessness Arms outstretched hair swirling tendrils No breath, just Calm Silence She liked drowning Forgetting the strife her older sisters caused her She eagerly drank in the soothing intoxicating…

DONNA JEAN

11/15/18 The fires in Northern California burned out the town of Paradise. Aptly named it is where many retirees spend their final days. The house my grandfather built with his own hands stands no longer. Just the whiff of memory remains. My mother grew up in Paradise. Went to school, church, Sunday school. She is…