Many thanks to Appalachia Bare for offering to publish the poem “Little Margaret.” It’s about an old friend, the late James Elton “Jim” McMillan, Jr. While I was attending Emerson College in Boston in 1969-70, I lived in a house in Newton Lower Falls, Massachusetts, with Jim and his wifeContinue Reading
Our evening was cooler than expected. A quick but fierce thunderstorm moved through our late July afternoon that day, complete with loud rolling booms, cracks of lightning, and a torrent of falling water. On the northern Appalachian Trail, among the beech, maple, and birch-covered Green Mountains of Vermont, our campingContinue Reading
Detective Gowan stood across from me and fiddled with some recorder. He perked up when another detective entered the room. “Name’s Bob,” he said. “Bob Kroy.” He slid a paper in front of me. “Sign this before you make your statement. Says you’re tellin’ the truth – to the bestContinue Reading
Growing up in the 1960s during an era of assassinations, civil unrest, and the war in southeast Asia, at times I wore sadness like a raincoat as a palpable and threatening cloud hung over the nation. My memories of that time recur as a series of stock and binary images: Continue Reading