The great naturalist, Edward O. Wilson, has died. But the world has not lost him, as the common phrase goes. He lives on his books, in his colleagues, and in the countless people he has influenced and taught. He lives on in the environment and ecosystems he helped and is still helping to save. It is not necessary to meet and know someone personally to benefit from his or her […]
It needed many years, but when I finally realized that as a writer I would not be famous or successful in a way that would pay the bills, and when I understood what a lucky thing that was, the self-imposed burden of the idea fell away, leaving me light, free, ready, and glad for whatever may come. Painful as it was, I do not regret the process; I am not […]
The dry grass of my ambition has a beauty all its own.
All the more so with the fences down.
And the graveyard overgrown.
Portland, Oregon — December 1988
Before Me, the Past
Before me, the past speeds ahead.
It arrives, I know not when.
Behind me, the future is silent.
It knows that I am dead.
Pity, there is no grief in starlight.
Mercy, cries for the unborn.
Duty, is a failed science.
Love, walks alone.
You show me a sign.
A bright, fathomless smile.
As if there were, anything.
As if we were, real.
As if, rainbows give birth to children.
And they do: rainbows, and strawberries.
Fallen angels, white as any snowflake.
Black as an eye in a song.
Blue, as when light returns.
Green, because everything is so damn silly.
Honeyed as any flower.
Or as the scent and color of skin.
Intimate, as graveyard stone.
Whispers, with cold gray fingertips.
Wet shoes: where have I been?
And how did you find me?
A siren in a cityscape.
Moonlight, on a table.
Perhaps, or, simply, fate.
A wet sponge by the sink.
A leaf, a candle.
An unexpected need.
Poems, Slightly Used, November 21, 2010
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The printed certificate with ornamental border shows that I was born in 1956, on the twentieth day of the month of May, in the small town of Dinuba, in the county of Tulare, in the central part of the San Joaquin Valley of California, southeast of the much larger town of Fresno. The third of three sons, I was named William on the third day after my glorious Sunday afternoon […]
Wealth and fame? I sought them in my own simple way, but not for their own sake; I was willing to be rich and famous if it meant earning a living. And as I have neither, it’s useless to say or to guess what I’d do if I did. I’m also fairly sure I once feared them, which is another way of saying I once feared myself, which is another […]
William Michaelian 