early morning quiet, cheap motel
     watching, praying, waiting
        work begins again today
              JMU in the CAA . ..

  The Colonial Assassination Association

tired, long and lonely
grateful for the rest
ambiguity
even at my best

European trains
Sunlit Italy
Latin, a little Latin
Shakespeare's tragedies

                JMU

There's no way to know for sure
Have to trust when I can't understand
Also need suspicion
Also need to hold your hand

Music makes me happy
I know very little Thai
This is what it sounds like
When Doves Cry

He said he saw Prince in Spain
Best show of his life
Summer of 69
Cuts Like a Knife

I like those 80s ladies
Even in 2022
Her hair is wavy black
Her eyes are ocean blue

   We are the Dukes of JMU!

be ignited or be gone, wrote Ms. Oliver
I was hired at JMU by George Toliver
       for me philosophy’s dawn

O Mary, help me be ignited before gone.

Curious coincidences.

Probably it doesn't make sense
But I still pray
At times
Even when I can't believe in God

I like Albert Camus
My favorite French atheist
Unde Malum?
North Africa. Berber Mother.

Me at JMU
Lonely as the rain
Her boyfriends studlier than I
Might place Life of Pi

The Shinkansen is impressive
Chesterton aggressive
I tend toward confessive
Like Augustine. But still shy.

               Thank you, Ry.

staring at Guernica, focus on the flower
no man knows the day or hour

but for my friends and country I will try
prayers above Seattle's starry sky

Fr. John Grace, help me be true
decades later, I still remember you

                                             Amen.

UCF XGF ACX AKGW
EHAEBW WKGW
JMU KL BXM LEKH
BXU'HH FOFZ QZFOEKH

I can't quite find it
Always out of reach
About to get my car
Might drive to the beach

Taipei 101
Restaurant in Cary
At times my father's voice
Deep and loud and scary

Ravenstory stamps
Carolina Inn
Get me through till Sunday
Monday begin again

I miss you, Dr. Thomas
Duke Divinity
Sweetly Southern charm
Help me Barthly see

           Mail my destiny

All men are created equal
But all women are definitely not
Buddhamind in Bangkok
Tremendum at Angkor Wat

Me at JMU
UVA was Scott
Ry is Virginia Tech
I post and play and plot

Just a few rooms
I do not own a yacht
Als Ick Kan
Give the best I got

      2037. What?

I’ll never figure it out
Why don’t I just accept it?

I lay her in sweet silence
And still try to resurrect it

Think I’ll sleep till noon
Maybe dream of Susan Meek

I took history with Dr. Yoon
Little Latin, less Greek :)

When I heard the learned ethics professor
Proclaim "There are no moral facts"
Quickly I sat up, my ears attentive,
My mind focused and even frenzied.

I listened to him lecture, turned in my paper
And then walked into society
Where I gazed in perfect silence
At all of the passing people.

19999
Waking Ned Devine
Some other time
Guilt, but I still climb

Never right without the woman
Therefore, never right
Carolina Inn
2 flights 1 night's delights

Fire on the patio
Bipolar fascination
Heraclitus more than Thales
San Francisco meditation

A Man Called Otto
Me at Angkor Wat
JMU, Albert Camus
Mi hermano Scott


      The Old Man and the Sea

                  Si. I taught.

Albert Camus
Now we have Plague too

Fascism
With an American twist

I rebel; therefore, we exist.

2:37 a.m.
    Thinking of Dr. Thomas again
             Gratitude without end


                        Mozart
                  and Barthian.

The gun nuts and the Trumpfucks
Freedom to destroy
In Thailand I rode an elephant
Buddhamind? Nitnoy.

Reading of James Madison
2/22/23
Watching the Two Towers
Oxford. Xie Xie ni.

Philosophy at JMU
Learning from Dr. Wiles
San Francisco Zen Center
The Buddha gently smiles

Religion at JMU
Dr. William Thomas
Wagering with Pascal
Help me keep my promise

                  Amen.

Dr. Thomas was very caring
Years at JMU
Eine kleine nachtmusik
3032

I'm a mess of contradictions
Carolina blue
Hath the rain a father?
Monsieur Albert Camus

                   Absurd!

I like universities
But just to walk around
Play a little basketball
La bibliotecha alone

I'm socially awkward
Even at 53
I miss her like the rain
Fr. Foster in Rome

Dorm room at JMU
I share my loneliness
She listens very well
Exiled from my home

Travel is travail
And the thrill of Otherness
Her beautiful pink dress
Om mane padme Om

             La Florida ...

I'm gonna lose my memories
But will I be remembered?
I promise I will let you in
When I'm soul Septembered

She sits in the bleachers
A little to my right
We talk in her dorm room
Her wedding, then moonlight

Exoplanets spin
Extrasolar water
I have 3 sons
She has 2 daughters

I've been desperately seeking
I remember JMU
5 minutes in Denver
Eternity be true

                I love you.

No one important
Which is fine by me
I fear American fame

Susan Darlene Meek
JMU
Tell me - What's in a name?

Inner Harbor, Baltimore
Mistake
But no one to blame

Chicago
Seattle
St. Louis - not Notre Dame

          Secret Flame

Sometimes silences for centuries
Unexpectedly emerge
In Greece like a whisper
Within the Demiurge

Sometimes silences for centuries
Emerge on foreign shores
After rains the sun
Songs from civil wars

Invisible threads connect
Her email makes me wonder
Lightning over the Atlantic
In Reno rolling thunder

Rocky Mountain Higher
Jokic on the break
JMU for two
Lady of the Lake

      Please do not forsake

I took Existentialism at 19
First told of The Plague

Fascism is a foolish thing
Certain in this world so vague

The French language sounds so
                   beautiful
   The cathedrals astonish too

I know that life is often Absurd
   But I wish joy to be with you

               Monsieur Camus

From Mr. Markson and Mr. Eliot
I learned the Way of Allusions
Kinda like a game
Pick out the profusions

Dylan does the same
I believe I'll Dust my Broom
Never been to Notre Dame
Do not talk on Zoom

Been to South Side Chicago
Been to Wrigley Field
Ben Stiller's Quinlin
My son too New Dealed

He plays Magic the Gathering
And also Destiny 2
Thailand for the Jai
James at JMU

               2040 blue

The music has to be right
So the punishments will be right.
That's what Confucius believed
I stop by Mason Nation
I am very well received

JMU is purple and gold
For me, Albert Camus
Chicago is Maroon
I'm also Carolina blue
She's UNCW

           American Cosmic!

81 South
Camus at JMU
Absurd Theonerd
Pondicherry Zoo

DC metro train
She's dressed in black
I'm too shy
Too shy, Jack

6066
Centuries have passed
Come Sail Away by Styx
Hey Now! Everlast

          
                Susan!

I revealed the way my mind works
Will they treat me kind?
I just wanna talk
And I want to travel blind

1985
Moonlight at the beach
2009
In Taiwan I try to teach

It all just slips away
What dreams may come?
O you future folk!
JMU alum

                    Sophia!

I might be a tragedy
But I might be Istanbul
Time is not a line
Tacos till I'm full

Today a taxi service
My oldest son is Q
If Denver does remember
2022

1987
We go to JMU
Black lace, green light
Just a fantasy it's true

         Me inside you.

His friends called him Fritz
Scared me at JMU
Scared me in Chicago
But I like parts, yes I do

There is always madness in love
But there is always reason in madness
In the silence she's my glove
She holds me in the sadness

                   Beach hotel.
                We finally talk.
                       Decades.
                      Gladness.

The isolation is frightening at times
I reach out but do not reach
You should see the girls
Who live in Satellite Beach!

Shared privacy, One love
Hablo un pequito Espanyol
Vegetarian burritos
80s Rock n' Roll

I like those Taoist Immortals
I climbed Yangmingshan
Thin Red Line
Scifi Gamla Stan

The marriage is Disaster
But she gave me the gift of travel
The World's Greatest Detective
The Riddler too unravels

All the King's Men at JMU
She calls him Jackie Bird
I rebel; therefore we exist
One man against the Absurd

                    Word!

The last time I saw
Romeo and Juliet
They played it as nihilist
But it ain't necessarily so

Once Upon a Time
English country dancing
Dean and Irene Sarnelle
To grandmother's house we go

Romeo and Juliet
Are together in eternity
We can be like they are!
She and I. Ella y Yo.

Exit 222
Staunton all aglow
Not far from JMU
An Irish fairy told me so

                 Snow!

The Catholic Church
Both wounds and gifts
Every Rose Has Its Thorn

Stained glass, Spanish Mass
Immigrant upflift
Authoritarian, closed, ****

Celtic Cross on Franklin Street
Northwest JVC
Paul McCartney in Baltimore
We sing Let it Be

Had a physics teacher once
Mr. Peterson. Dorn.
CCM at JMU
Buddhamind reborn

           Humility and Pride
          Reverence and Scorn

       Gabriel, blow your horn.

Our politics is so bad
Was it always thus?
American decay
Very little trust

I'd like to take a Ferry Boat
Seattle in the rain
Maybe Budapest
Maybe Portugal or Spain

She's gentle, kind, and lovely
Both of us JMU
I'm a Solitary Man
Carolina blue

Dread annihilation
Predatory terror
My life is suffering
But I pray it is no error

         Secret Sharer

Let Jesus have his own death
Not for you or me
She walks right near the water
3773

Slowly guacamole
Intent infinitely
Do my best, treasure chest
Irish eyes? Oui.

Maybe Baltimore this summer
Please keep her little boats
Comedy with Dante
Tragedy with goats

I miss JMU sometimes
Purple! Purple and gold.
When you go forth and Sally
Go forth and Sally bold!

              Tales to be told ...

One for Ethan tonight
I did not forget you, my friend
Come crashing through your door
Aqui in Maryland

JMU it's true
Philadelphia, CCM
Phoenix, Arizona
Only a matter of when

            Fr. Louis
         Catholic Zen