040325

after rain
the grass grows an inch and the
resurrection fern erects

040225b

tin pot dictator
straining over your golden throne
yearning for love

040225

One day, while studying a 520 million year old rock formation in western Utah, and strolling across a slope consisting of shattered shale slabs, I came across a chunk of rock with a bunch of big pyrite crystals in it, some as wide as my thumb. These were of course limonite, oxidized by sunlight, but beautiful perfect cubes. I picked the rock up, and then saw another, and another. They curved around the slope in an arc parallel to bedding. One thin layer stuffed with iron sulfide, now with water added, but laid down in an oxygen-free environment on or below the sea floor half a billion years ago. (I know this was marine, because the formation, the Wheeler Shale, is full of trilobites.) The slope of broken shale covered the solid rock from which it had come, so even though I knew where the pyrite-rich bed was, all I could find were fragments. Some I gave away to elementary teachers who had rock and mineral collections in their classrooms, some I gave to other people, and a few I still have left. I've had them for approximately 45 years, which is less than one 100,000th of 1% of the time they have existed, first under the sea floor, later in a huge mountain range, and finally shining in the Utah sun.

040125b

Yes, We Have No Anteaters (an abcedarian)

About that aardvark in the room
Boisterously bothering us at our ease
Cat's scared of the clumsy thing
Disappeared and we can't find her
Eleven o'clock and your mom's due soon
For God's sake what will she say?
Get that flea-bitten monster out no doubt
Hell, what does she think we're trying to do?
I give up
Just call; tell her we've gone out
Knife slipped, instant care, I don't care
Let me think
Maybe your cousin
No, her place is much too small
Oh no! Where's it got to now?
Please don't tell me
Quiet! I don't hear it now
Remember, these things are tricky
So, you go around through the kitchen
Take this blanket to trap the critter
Unfortunately they're pretty fast
Velocity magnifies the effect of mass
What I'll do is circle around the other way
Exactly, a pincer movement
You got him!
The zebra last week, now that was a real challenge!

040125

the universe dies
when there are no spare parts
you mean protons

033125b

Signed by the cover artist, Kelly Freas, in the lower left corner.

033125

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DN 130 is almost full, but 131 is wide open to submissions.