Passage

from the carousel

different children waving

with every turn

~ arem

after solstice

sure winter's here

and it's a little chilly

but don't worry about me

~ RM

Canyon of Misunderstanding

Among the Lizard Mounds of his innocent age, shaded by maple, acorned by oak, he had trembled and been the boy who had to look beneath skirts, had to see what was hidden, to glimpse the forbidden. Now, under the barren sky near the other side of the broad canyon of his life, he has become the man who buys tobacco which he does not smoke, but sprinkles it with ceremony he does not understand, on sacred ground and the graves of old friends, hoping for forgiveness of sins he didn't know he committed.

.

someone mowing grass

over his grandfather's coffin

listens to a ballgame

~ Ralph Murre

Travel Report

Old New Mex

And you is goin to Old New Mex
to hunt for you dyin Columbia?
Vaya con Dios.
~ Norbert Blei

I saw The Virgin
pictured as conquistadora
in the Sun God’s
land of enchantment,
and along the tracks
north of Albuquerque,
where pink adobe homes
are surrounded
by razor wire,
I saw the land
of disenchantment.
I saw the color
of the blood of Christ
and the blood of the conquered
and the sage
beneath purple mountains
coexist,
like Santa Fe chic
and pueblo poor.
I saw America
in the unfiltered light
of a high desert.
I saw my dying Columbia
still alive.

~ Ralph Murre

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New Links: Had the pleasure, while traveling, of meeting the photographer David Lyons. Follow the new link listed at the right to view his amazing work. Also, and this is WAY overdue, please check out Steve Kastner's "Door County Style" webmag, one of the primo sites for DC news and scuttlebutt, which just did a very gracious plug and review of the Arem Arvinson Log. ~ RM