Author’s note:  This is a performance piece for five actresses ranging in age from 30-80.  Although they represent various aspects of one person, they can and should be distinct both in appearance and in attitude. Staging for this piece is versatile.  It could be  a multi-media piece, with images projected upstage; it also lends itself to stylized blocking or choreography that allows the characters to interact with one another physically throughout.  It also could be a play f

those dead leaves are alive, even when you know  an October wind blows them low to the pavement.  Even though you watch through a double-paned window and even though you’re known for your good sense, you can’t help but think they, I mean the leaves, are leaving your street in a hurry because they know something you can’t know.

You carry a well-packed U-Haul box to the car,  trip over the hose, fall flat, arms out,  as if desperate to thrust a  gift on someone...

They say we come into the world afraid of snakes no matter whether venomous or not.  Avoidance is the way we’re made although this  truth...

for Charlie Arvin If you heard slurs, pauses, apologies for calling at supper, for calling at all, you might think you overheard the...

Pedilavium           Bernard of Clairvaux:  “Feet-washing is cleansing of those daily offenses which seem inevitable for those who walk ...

How will we know it’s a wrap? Time to take a bow and sigh, “It’s been grand and on behalf of the band, We’ll see you when the roads are...

Ted Kaczynski and others I’m so tired of disappointed men who sit in cabins pecking invectives on archaic Underwoods. Don’t even think of...

Each morning I mourn my reflection  by asking a metaphysical question: Who is this woman watching me wash  a crumpled face and brush...

The western widow has options for weeds.  She can weave a mourning coat  from pigweed, ragweed, stinkweed,  even locoweed.  Wanting a...

A blue parakeet on her perch, her tiny claws clasp the wooden bar. She watches the cat on the couch feigning sleep.  The bird knows...

I’m not proud of using a glue trap to catch a field mouse, finding it lying on its side portrait of a rodent in repose. It discomfits me...

Hotel Hasselbacken in Stockholm In our  darkened kitchen with my sharpened knife, I make thin slices in each little potato. Concentration...

Translation - to endure one’s fate Whenever I considered my spent life I did not foresee my being so petty. My oldest friend dislikes my...

A study in blank verse                           The predators of chickens: people worldwide,    coyotes, foxes, possums, owls and bears....

male’s loud bob-o-link a harsh guttural chuck three-syllable song, coo-coo-cup a  faint and thin bee-yup or yep a single, loud klee-yer ...