To Give, Eternal

“While you have a thing it can be taken from you... 
but when you give it, you have given it.
No robber can take it from you.  
It is yours then for ever when you have given it.
It will be yours, always.
That is to give.”

- James Joyce

On Literary Etiquette

"I was brought up in the great tradition of the late 19th century or early part of this century that a writer never complains, never explains and never disdains.''

-James Michener, winner of the Pulitzer Prize four decades ago for ''Tales of the South Pacific'' 

The Influences We Heed

"Halfway to work and Merriman already has told me
What he thinks about the balanced budget, the Mets'
Lack of starting pitching, the dangers of displaced
Soviet nuclear engineers, soy products, and diesel cars.

I look out the window and hope I'll see a swan.
I hear they're bad-tempered but I love their necks
And how they glide along so sovereignly.
I never take the time to drive to a pond

And spend an hour watching swans. What
Would happen if I heeded the admonitions of beauty?
When I look over at Merriman, he's telling Driscoll
That the President doesn't know what he's doing
With China. "China," I say out loud but softly.
I go back to the window. It's started snowing."

- "Opinion" by Baron Wormser

from Subject Matter: Poems