Tagged: Reading
A new poem…
You & I
we navigate a
landscape of thorns
you & I
knowing full well
no matter how lightly we tread
the sharpness will find us
almost as if it were seeking
our pliant flesh
so eager to inflict hurt
for the sheer pleasure
of watching us squirm
* * * *
I wrote this piece as a response against the kind of world we presently live in, where a small minority seek to limit the terms of discourse, control language and dole out heaping portions of shame and abuse (while claiming to defend some kind of moral high ground).
Their demeanor and attitude have poisoned conversations, cut off debate and reduced us to a population that is divided, paranoid and desperately afraid of causing offense.
“All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.” (Norman Finkelstein).
You said it, Norm.
Cover reveal: “The Definition of Melancholy”
Would you buy a book by this man?
Image by Liam Burns
Best Books Read in 2021
Fiction:
Ministry For the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead
Maxwell’s Demon by Steven Hall
Franz Kafka: Lost Writings edited by Reiner Stach (Translation: Michael Hofmann)
Sensation Machines by Adam Wilson
Cascade (Short Stories) by Craig Davidson
The Cold Millions by Jess Walter
Last Orgy of the Divine Hermit by Mark Leyner
The Great Glass Sea by Josh Weil
Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins
Fourth of July Creek by Smith Henderson
The Body Scout by Lincoln Michel
Honorable Mention:
Quicksand by Emmanuel Bove
Appleseed by Matt Bell
Things About Which I Know Nothing (Short Stories) by Patrick Ness
What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemison
Phase Six by Jim Shepard
Joe’s Liver by Paul Di Filippo
A Man At Arms by Stephen Pressfield
Poetry:
Songs of Mihyar the Damascene by Adonis
Graphic Novel:
Berlin by David Lutes
Non-Fiction
Love and Capital: Karl & Jenny Marx by Mary Gabriel
A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders
Dark Money by Jane Mayer
The Earth is Weeping: The Epic Story of the Indian Wars by Peter Cozzens
Pictures At a Revolution: Five Movies & the Birth of the New Hollywood by Mark Harris
Marx’s Das Capital: A Biography by Francis Wheen
Germany: From Revolution to Counter Revolution by Rob Sewell
Essays After Eighty by Don Hall
After the Apocalypse by Srecko Horvat
The Writing Life by Annie Dillard
Honorable Mention:
The Commandant edited by Jurg Amann
What About the Baby? Some Thoughts on the Art of Fiction by Alice McDermott
2022: A New Hope
Image by Liam Burns
Mutant Thoughts (ii)

This is intended to be a semi-regular column devoted to my various enthusiasms, pet peeves and the strange notions that all-too-frequently bedevil me. Not intended for folks with delicate sensibilities or soft brains. Read on.
It’s been a long time since we last touched base and, as always, the fault is mine. I’m a lousy friend, a terrible correspondent, constantly getting sucked up into a project and completely forgetting those nearest and dearest me.
I fully admit it: I am a selfish, thoughtless bastard.
But I’ve been working and so that erases all sins, all culpability. A brand new, 40-page story under my belt, plus a number of solid poems, ideas bouncing around in my skull like pingpong balls in a dryer. So no apologies: as far as I’m concerned, when it comes to my writing, the ends always justify the means.
* * * * * * *
- Our thirty-first anniversary yesterday. Sherron and I half a country apart but still talked on the big day, and I sent her a couple of poems, as well (what can I tell you? I’m an old school romantic). We have an amazing relationship, a partnership of equals. She keeps me honest and human—without her I’d be much more nihilistic and misanthropic (believe it or not). Friend, lover and comrade. To the end.
- More fun on Twitter this past week: some twerp who writes urban dragon novels putting me in my place because I dared offer a few words of advice to a fellow colleague. He had posted about doing research for his next book, I responded with my thoughts and he told me not to attempt to communicate with higher order beings such as himself. And remember, folks: he writes books about dragons.
- The great “de-cluttering” continues, as we divest this house of decades of accumulated stuff. This has been in the works ever since we started renos in late spring. Boxes and boxes of books and VHS tapes hurled out the door. Old clothes, crap we haven’t used in years, taking up space, gathering dust. No more. And not a single regret, only relief, the house seeming lighter since we started the process.
- My mantra this week: “What does it cost me to be tolerant?”
- There’s a possibility (however slight) that my second hip surgery might happen in September. Inconvenient, since we’ll also have another grandchild arriving around that same time but, damnit, just to be able to walk normally again…won’t believe it until I get the call to report for pre-op. Then the game is on.
- Hoping that the forecast is right and we’ll get some decent rain in the next few hours. Like a lot of North America, it has been a hot, dry summer on the Canadian prairies, the skies reeking of burning boreal forests. Dystopia is here, folks, the future you refused to believe in banging on your door.
- Finished two great books in the past month: Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Ministry For the Future and The Earth is Weeping: The Epic Story of the Indian Wars by Peter Cozzens. Movies that impressed me: Clio Barnard’s “The Selfish Giant” and Miranda July’s “Kajillionaire”.
- That’s it for now–hopefully it won’t be a month before you hear from me again. But, in the meantime: let’s be civil to each other, shall we? At least try it…and see what happens.

Ambient
I love the sounds Nature makes
when she’s happy and none trouble
her serene countenance, vexing
her with their tireless machines
She hums contentedly
tending her bursting flower boxes
attentive to each seed or shoot
showering them with maternal love
She likes to get her hands dirty
except for the blood
which flows so copiously
it inevitably leaves a stain
She would say she’s blameless
as an iris, tender as a fawn
but we know her as a ruthless foe
when her existence is threatened
Leave her to her graces
praise her in word and deed:
the many shades of green she grows
the beauty she won’t concede
Written on my back deck June 2, 2021, while being serenaded by several varieties of bird song.

My new office space (and a new beginning)
Yes, can’t hold back any longer. The second floor renovations almost done, the restored hardwood floor an enormous improvement over the ancient, dusty, shag carpet that once covered it (said aged, toxic carpet being one of the suspected “hot zones” for the initial onset of COVID-19, report from the CDC still pending).
My office is now up and running, stocked with some new book cases, hundreds of volumes surrounding me…and yet there seems to be more space than ever, each square foot fully utilized. Gone is the clutter and torn, sagging posters. Even minimized my display of toys and miniatures. This is the space of a grown, mature artist, not a terminal juvenile (that stuff goes down to my “man cave” in the basement).
Here are some pictures to show you what we’ve done. First a “Before” shot, once the carpet had been ripped up and the office virtually emptied out:

Now here’s a couple of pictures taken this morning:



Just looking at these snaps has my left hand twitching in anticipation of some serious writing. I’m talking about a binge that leaves me emotionally and physically mangled (ah, the good old days). Imagine having a space completely designed around your wishes and specifications. It’s a dream come true. The beautiful little touches that make it completely mine—
Including, as a grand finale, one wall that my wife and I layered with papier mache…incorporating fragments torn from an old, tattered copy of James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man I had lying around.
I call it the “Joyce Wall” and a closeup looks like this:

Work on the upper floor still isn’t complete—there’s scraping and crack-filling and painting…and then all the furniture has to be put back in the proper rooms. It’s been a process but we’re getting there.
My new creative play area excites me beyond belief. There’s a sense that my career and approach to writing are getting a reboot, a fresh beginning, distant, unexplored horizons beckoning.
What dreams may yet come…
NOTEBOOKS: 2010 – 2020 (The Proof)
NOTEBOOKS: 2010 – 2020 (The Cover Reveal!)
Here it is, ladies and gents.
Chris Kent’s rendition of the cover for Black Dog Press’ 15th book, a collection of my jottings and authorial asides we’ve dubbed Notebooks: 2010 -2020.
Official release date mid-April, but you can buy it right now from either Smashwords or Kindle.
