Gratitude Makes the World Go Around
Dear Brother in the Uprising against Shmegeggedom Thank you for the times in Café Voltaire (I feel privileged to be able to steal a weekly spot in your schedule) Thank you for being a clown sometimes…
Author: Mark J. Chmiel
What You Understand Depends on Where You Stand & Where You Stand Depends on What You Understand
for Ellen Mev looked up to Ann Manganaro Co-founder of Karen Catholic Worker House Sister of Loretto medical doctor Compañera to Father John Kavanaugh When Mev went to El Salvador in 1993 For the annual…
I’m Getting Better at This
A beautiful sunny afternoon 70 degrees Dear Bella Levenshtein For months I’ve wanted to visit with you But packed schedules The oddities of time and noncoincidences of space Emails unresponded to It didn’t ever happen…
Summer Goal: Cleaning up the Basement
To pitch 200 pounds and 30 years and umpteen teetering stacks Of nostalgia, Weltschmerz, and saudades (“Les jours s’en vont je demeure“) Into the recycle bins and trash dumpsters of Saint Louis By noon, 8.22.2013…
After Reading Chapter 6 of the Bhagavad Gita
You won’t find It At Cafe Napoli or down on Washington Avenue On Telegraph Ave or at the French Laundry In an apartment overlooking Central Park or a long vacation at a Cannes beach You…
Beethoven, Smiling
In the posh concert hall The renowned symphony orchestra is going to town Offering the rapt, elegant audience A rousing rendition A awesome interpretation Of the Ninth Symphony Lo and behold it’s the famed Fourth…
After Reading Levertov’s Poem on the 1972 Christmas Bombing
For Suzanne Renard & Andrew Wimmer Haven’t you had such a fantasy Sure, a different decade A different civilization being destroyed Different men The same crimes Getting away with mass murder Mind movies of…
Father Daughter Bond
She was an undergraduate at Georgetown Her father was a successful, ambitious, and wealthy man She and he had an arrangement That was based on total candor Mid-evening he would call her from New York…
It’s Pounded into Our Heads since Kindergarten
It’s pounded into our heads since kindergarten It gradually inflates the metallic balloon of the self It feeds delusion 24/7 It renders invisible the needs of others It’s A.P. everything It’s resumé padding It’s the…
Norman Morrison
Now, maybe some U.S. citizens over 65 Remember the name “Norman Morrison” But many people in Vietnam of all ages Know that name The young Quaker immolated himself in 1965 Deliberately close to Robert McNamara’s…