Not many days ago, and an equally uncertain number of nights, I read backward and aloud the last page of Samuel Beckett’s The Unnamable. Standing before our big front window, paced by the commas, I read the words slowly and with feeling. When I reached the top of the page, I wondered if the author might not have done the same thing himself. It’s possible he could even have written […]
I’m reading Ulysses again, and Joyce and I agree, all three of us have changed. . [ 1583 ]
If ever I were to strike out what I don’t understand, What would stop me from striking out more each day, Until at last I’ve stricken out everything, Except my own poor ignorance? . [ 1574 ]
We meet each other in different languages, even when we write and speak the same. What we read and say and hear, is who we are and who we’ve been. What we mean, or what we think or hope we mean, matters less than listening, with love. . [ 1562 ]
Terrible poetry, yet what a joy it is to read, for love is blooming with the weeds. . [ 1532 ]
Warm, cloudy, humid. Fires east, fires south. And here I am, recognizing once again the sheer luxury it is to be able, for so long, to pursue my tiny line of thinking — to read my books, to write my notes and poems and then pretend them to the world — for pretending and publishing are much alike — tho’ the mask I wear is nearly identical to what it’s […]
Moonlight, streetlight, starlight. I saw the skunk again, just as I was starting my run. With its tail held high, it was crossing the street from the yard of one neighbor to that of another. When I was done, I met it again coming down the driveway of the house just west of ours. This time its tail was down. In no hurry at all, it crossed the street again. […]
In this house there are three thousand books. Early in the morning, I go out and read the cool, damp grass with my bare feet. When I come back inside, there are still three thousand books. There are fir needles, flower petals, a clover leaf. . [ 1510 ]
I go on reading things in Emerson’s journal he thought would never see print. And yet here they are, more than a century and a half later, and so here is Emerson. Almost word for word, I remember many things said by my grandparents. And so here they are. Friends, parents, relatives, animals, places, here they are, to be forgotten and remembered for however long. And here we are. Glaciers. […]
Like April, and again like May, June has been a cool, cloudy, rainy month — much more so than what is considered normal, but of course normal is nothing but an average of the dry years and the wet years taken together. Last June, for a stretch of several days, we had to cover our cucumbers and dahlias with sheets to protect them from record high temperatures, which registered, at […]
William Michaelian 