Postcards

Too many small towns
I forget where we first met
Dumas? New Salem?


I’m a vagabond
Allergic to planting roots
Always struck restless.


Keep a bag ready,
Grand adventures beckoning
I’ll send a postcard.

Snap Judgement 

While shopping at Publix today I kept crossing paths with a woman in a Trump for President t-shirt. She looked to be about my age (late 50’s to early 60’s). I tried making eye contact with her, wondering what I’d see there, but she barely looked up.

I wondered about her. How does a woman who has lived through these past five decades support someone like Trump? He’s admittedly groped women against their will, cheated on two, and probably all three, of his wives, discussed openly that he treats his women with little or no respect, and yet some women continue to find him acceptable as a presidential candidate.

I made some snap judgements about this woman: racist, uneducated, ill-informed. I deduced that she is a FOX news watcher and a non-reader. All this I got from a Trump for President t-shirt.
 

What to Read? What to Read?

After weeks of dragging my feet, on Sunday evening I finally finished reading the eighth, and thus far, final book in the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon. Fittingly, my well worn Kindle Paper White e-reader bit the dust with less than 3% of the book remaining as if it knew I didn’t want the story to end. Thank goodness I have the kindle app on my iPhone, though, so I was able to cry myself to sleep with Siri comforting me.


She’s a rock, that Siri. Salt of the earth, and all that.


As soon as I was able to leave work on Monday afternoon I drove with cautious haste to Best Buy and bought a new Kindle Paper White. The relative ease with which I registered the device and downloaded my virtual library restored my sense of well being. Once again all was right with my world.

Except that now I had no idea what to read next. At random I chose a book with a catchy title. The Shelf Life of Happiness by David Machado. In contrast to the weeks, nay months, I’d spent with the Outlander books, The Shelf Life of Happiness took exactly four hours to read. It’s a good book, totally unlike the Outlander series, and I found that comforting. The last thing I needed was a poorly written replica of a cherished series. 


Currently I’m looking for my next great read, and I’m open to suggestions. My tastes are eclectic, but I greatly enjoy science fiction/fantasy and post-apocalyptic novels, (zombies are a plus), as long as they’re well written. Outlander was a bit of a departure for me because it was a historical, albeit, time-travel romance.

So what are your suggestions dear readers? I’m eager for some new perspectives. The world is my library, and this is my motto: Have Kindle; Can Download.
Note: I still purchase physical books, just in case of an apocalypse, lest anyone should fear for my reading soul.

Peace, and happy reading, people.

Beauties and Beasties

Three hags around a cauldron hot,
Two tall, one short, all steeped in rot

“Sisters, dear,” the short witch rasped,
“Please join me in my evil chant.”

And so the wicked three clasped hands
Enpowered by their fevered rant:

Warted toads and skinny skinks,
Strangled pigs and hair of lynx,

Essence of offal, rattlesnake’s tongue,
Sweat of warthog, elephant’s dung.

Lizard’s lips, slime of slug,
C’mon girls let’s chug a lug.

Feverishly they consumed the potion
A night of devilment set in motion

Quickly worked the magic brew
Hags became beauties right on cue

Summoned they a carriage grand
And ventured out upon the land

In search of men unvirtuous,
The shallow and oblivious

Easy prey for witches three
On Halloween, the hags were free

Tortured men with promised kisses
Allowed them to fulfill their wishes

But every man seduced in turn
Soon felt his skin begin to burn

Venomous kisses raised seeping blisters
The mark of conquest from evil sisters

And when All Hallows Eve was o’er
Three witches laughed at settled scores

The House

A lifetime ago
a summer rendezvous here
when the house was whole

I’d escaped my life
you’d made all the arrangements
uninterrupted.

Those days forgotten
or merely sweet memories
of crisp linen love.

One

And this is how we change the world. Please read more at redswrap.com. Peace.

Jan Wilberg's avatarRed's Wrap

I can’t change everything but I can change this one thing.

A homeless man comes in from the cold, takes off his leaking boots, and peels away the socks he’s been wearing for months. But he has no clean socks, so once he warms up, he puts the same torn, filthy socks back on his hurting feet.

But, wait! you say. This man’s problem isn’t his rotting, filthy socks. His problem is that he is homeless. I know that. But I also know I can’t change his homelessness but I can change his socks.

A homeless woman settles down for the night in an alley. She takes off her pants and her underwear and folds them neatly in a small pile. Then she sleeps upright, learning on an old brick building, her bare bottom on the concrete. She’s having her period and can’t risk bleeding through her only clothes.

She…

View original post 782 more words