Writing and Memory #6

Writing is painful/
Facing one's sad verities/
Emblazoned in words.

Life’s sad vagaries/

Often occlude happiness/

Thwarting life’s fullness.

  

Writing and Memory #5

 The persisting past/

Fabricates childhood bliss through/

Memory’s deceit.

“Now smile and say ‘cheese’”/
Childhood’s formal portraiture/
Instamatic joy. 

Writing and Memory #4

Distilled memories/
Of blissful childhood wracked and/
Rooted in the past.

As I grew older/
I put away childish things/
Now I want them back.

Writing and Memory #3

Memory impales/

Through its bitter verities/

The wish to forget.

 Dissimulation/
Life’s long struggle to conceal/
Inconstant terrors. 

  

Writing and Memory #2

An acknowledgment/
That love’s true inconstancy/
Is life’s saddest jest.

The past dissembles/
Then rearranges itself/
Revealing little.

Writing and Memory #1

Our auspicious start/

Hand-in-hand through life’s journey/

Never letting go. 

A Theory of Life

“Autobiographies do not form indisputable authorities. They are always incomplete, and often unreliable. Eager as I am to put down the truth, there are difficulties; memory fails especially in small details, so that it becomes finally but a theory of my life, with much forgotten and misconceived, with valuable testimony but often less than absolutely true, despite my intention to be frank and fair.” -- W.E.B. DuBois

A theory of life/

With memory's perfidy/

Occluding small truths. 

 

Baldwin Day

The life and work of the late, great writer James Baldwin occupies a central place of importance in my own life and intellectual work. Each year on his birthday (August 2), I present images and haiku based on my understanding and interpretation of his influence. I have added a couple of new thoughts, followed by some from the previous collection.