July Writing Prompt & Banner — Ronald Flores-Gunkle kindly allowed me to use his photo of an American Kestrel for our July Weeds & Wildflowers banner. I chose this photo because the bird is so striking. …

My week in reluctant photos — My week started off not too bad and got steadily worse. On Sunday, I visited Kathy, the former owner of my home. She now lives in a single-family neighborhood west of us and spends most of her retirement time gardening. I noticed the bugs above on one of her plants…

a poem — Like its land, American English is big and bold and brash, a language of Texans and endless plains and Grand Canyons, a language of gunslingers and sheriffs, of the Alaskan frontier and New York skyscrapers, towering and tenacious, tough and tremendous. But, my language lacked the soft words, the love…

My week in photos — It only takes a little bit of rain to bring out the fungi. But rain wasn’t really the story this week, although we did get a much-appreciated inch on Sunday. This week was all about heat, heat, and more heat. I know that was the theme for much of the…

A hybrid prose poem — The muse — who is she? — has never left me, I left her, exhausted, spent words lost in a sea of exhaustion paddling to stay afloat going nowhere but down, fast and it wasn’t the work of the words — it wasn’t the typing or the thinking — certainly…

My week in photos — I wasn’t feeling well Sunday. After two at-home Covid tests, I was confident I was only suffering from a non-Covid virus or allergies. I took one walk with Syau but wasn’t feeling up to taking any photos. I spent most of the day in my easy chair or in bed…

a poem — You blamed me not him not us just me Because you didn’t see the real me the hurt me the tired me You saw only the smiling me the kind me the dependable me I hid scars that were deep and wide and cruel But the signs were there if…