The Time Remaining

By Pat Gallagher

The first time the finite nature of human existence entered my mind was a remark uttered by the writer Harris Dulany in 1970. Harris and his wife Barry and their two young daughters were friends of mine. At the time they were living in a rambling brownstone in Fort Greene in Brooklyn. Harris had worked at the Strand Bookstore, famous for its collection and size. He said one day he’d had an epiphany when he was at the bookstore. Gazing at the enormous collection he realized that if he read a book a day he would die before he could read them all. I don’t know why I still remember this incident but the image of books representing the days of a life was compelling. Compared to the thousands of books on hundreds of shelves a lifetime is a very short shelf indeed.

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A Light in the Back of the Basement

By Carl Kopman

I keep my time with old things these days, poems and stories, diaries and journals, photographs and a lampshade;  a rescued trove of writing held to the worn and fading light of journey and memory and another day; the chaos of a crazier mind, the energy of taxi cab dreams, the callings of a younger man, fishermen off the Albion shore.

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A Collection Of These Things

By Carl Kopman

                                                                               When you ask me how to do it
How to make it make sense
Break the words in a Poem
So as to make them less dense

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Sweet Alabama

By Barbara Ridley

My social media feeds were full of calls to “Boycott Alabama!” “Leave!” “Never go there!” Andy Borowitz, one of my favorite political humorists, posted: “Americans given new reason never to go to Alabama.” I saw lots of Likes and Ha-Ha emojis. And then disparaging comments along the lines of: “Stop writing insults about Alabama; they’re 50th in education. They can’t read that shit.” More ha-ha’s.

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An Evening Walk

By Raleigh Ellisen

As she did every summer day Mitoyo prepared a cup of tea and a few crackers when Koichi returned from his long hours as a railway dispatcher. They talked about events of their day, and, while neither mentioned it, they hid their disappointment that there was no letter from their son Kenji.  After his tea Koichi took one cigarette from a pack, carefully placed it in his shirt pocket, and started on his long evening walk.

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Puppy Love

By Peggy Phillips

You know how they say that some people start to look like their dogs, or maybe it’s vice versa, that the dogs look like their owners? There was once a whole advertising campaign for dog food, I think, showing dogs and their owners almost looking like twins. You know what I mean; the tall, thin woman with lanky long hair and her afghan hound, the small woman with short blond, curly hair, lots of jewelry, and her blond toy poodle with its rhinestone collar and maybe a fur coat, Winston Churchill and a bull dog. I think you get the idea.

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