Banned in Danvers High

Oh Bleaker, your meep

So expressive, so concise

Now four letters -- banned

Meep! The power of the meaningless, Boston Globe, December 13, 2009

Locations

The Pilgrims landed more than once

First in Provincetown then later

In Plymouth

And this week we will eat turkey

To celebrate and not think too much

About Plymouth Rock, which is only a rock

Misnamed and mistreated

By tourists with chisels

Turning it to sand

Like the sand in Provincetown, positioned

As a hand

Waving to the open sea

On this rock, a myth was built, Boston Globe, Nov. 22, 2009

West of the Berlin Wall 20 Years Later

Walls come down. People reunite

Families come together

Others drift apart.

Walls come down.

Fathers throw up their hands. Old rules

dissolve into yesterday.

Replaced by joy and then by questions.

New structures go up

Because what is life

without containers?

Walls come down.

Are You Happy?

I recalled an intellectual happiness in college until

I saw a photo of the 20-something me,

plump, miserable and smiling a sorry smile.

Was I was unhappy then. Or did I have

a bad day when someone had a camera?

How do you measure happiness as it comes and goes?

A wind that sometimes sings and sometimes screams in with rain

Or a perfect flower that turns gangly overnight?

How do you measure happiness that changes?

A sidewalk that glows pink in the evening and turns hard in the noon glare

Or my own reflection – clear one day, clouded the next?

Reflections triggered by Women, if you're happy and you know it, Op Ed in the Boston Globe, Ellen Goodman

Smartphone Haiku

Smartphone Haiku

Ubiquitous phone

How you extend me beyond

My mere existence

Triggered by NPR's OnPoint radio program, Going Mobile