Am I the only one who:

1.  Finds every write I post sent to drafts first, and requiring my           wrangling it back out onto my page in order to be seen.

2.  Encounters error 502 not only on trying to post, but on switching    from home screen to messages.

3.  Never sees  half of the comments posted without going back to    look up the write in my index and bringing it up again.  I'm thanking  people for nice things they said over a week ago.  That's not right.

4.  Who has no way to get to anyone else's page unless I see their        
name in a comment they made somewhere else, so I can click on it    and go to their page.  What happened to the index/directory we
once had.

5.  Finds my carefully arranged layout changed when posted, thus
requiring complicated editing to get it back the way I want it.

6.  Felt it necessary to stop my monthly donation to HP because of the way the site has declined, and the refusal of Eliot York to respond
to anyone's e-mails - ever.

Am I to die with you still hating me
For something I never knew I did?
Has nothing I have done for you
In these last thirty-five heartbroken years
Earned me a tiny bit of your forgiveness?

I am old and sick and growing weak,
And life’s a struggle every day.
Your anger is a load almost too
Heavy for me to carry now,
But I can’t put it down because

My love for you has never wavered
And I nurture a small flame of hope
That some day you will realize
That I did the very best I could
With what I knew of parenting.

That I tried with all my heart to be
The television mom you longed for
And to master all the rules attached
That were impossible because
I couldn’t get past being who I am.

I so regret my imperfections
And the moments when I failed.
I’d give the last years of my life
To have a chance to try again
And maybe get it right this time.
          ljm

I’ve always had this fantasy
That if you die and go to Heaven
You’re not aware of earthly things
But if somebody left below
Should think of you, a bell rings.

A bell that only you can hear
With such lovely tinkling sound
A bell that tells you someone cared
That someone’s thinking of your smile,
Remembering the times you’ve shared.

Other Angels all around
Are doing what the angels do
Then one will stop and tilt her head
And you know that she’s hearing things
And smiling with the joy it brings.
ljm

Harlan never ever died.  
His words still burn like ******,
Scalding minds that revel in their rut.

He saw behind the curtain long before
The Tin Man or the scarecrow did
And he shouted out the travesties
That everyone refused to see.

His acid pen made pages boil
And much of it splashed over him
Creating scars that in my gentle fingers
I could never heal.

He created mountains where none were
And scaled them to the accolades
He made it known that he deserved.

I rode the wind with him for just a while
Though he offered me forever
It seemed too shiny for my eyes
And I blinked and turned aside
To stand and watch his comet soar.

He one day met a flameproof soul
And lept into the multiverse
With sound and fury as his steed
And her his tether to civility.

I  loved to share his meteor
As it began it’s wild ascent
I thrilled to watch it blaze the years
And see him tear the strictures down.
And even as his comet died
It took a bit of me along
To the place World-beaters go
When it is time to take a rest.
                               LJM

Feral winds blow through my mind
Creating mists I can’t see through
The road leaps up to trip my feet.
And when I stumble, all the pieces
That are me, get shaken up
And settle in a different way.

Flailing arms at foes I cannot see
I battle memes that have no name
And promise to report me to the boss
Who somehow didn’t turn out to be me,
And I am left to put my time card in the slot
Which sets the bells of checkmate ringing loudly.

Promises that were not made
Are broken in the headlong rush
To be the first one up the steps to no-place
Where the doorknobs all are putty
And the Sandwich man says
Have one more.  And this one isn’t poison.

The calendar has learned to dance
And practices a fox trot as
The pages dip, then glide away
And soon it is the next decade,
But I don’t have the taxi fare
And guess I’ll never get there.

I think I’ll never see one hundred.
That’s my fondest wish from childhood
But it reads backwards in the mirror
And the wind keeps blowing shut the door.
I saved my pennies for the ticket
But I’ll never get to see the movie.

Here I am with ball and jacks
And no one knows what they are for
I probably should pick them up
But that would mean I’m going home.
The streetlights haven’t come on yet
So I can stay and play some more.
           ljm

The drums of war pound once again
While war hawks screech high overhead
In a very crowded sky.
Goliath Rolls it’s heavy tread
Over David’s hapless sling
And doesn’t leave a spatter on the soil.

The Evil One puffs up in pride -
Him of the sly and snake-like eyes -
He didn’t break the Olympic Truce -
A tiny sop to salve the hatred
Roiling in frustration and despair
At lack of the ability to stop him.

The watchers huddle breathlessly
With wringing hands and hopeless eyes
Threatening to take away allowance
If one more tank should rumble over
The chalk mark on the wounded landscape
That denotes the aspiration to be free.

The great unwashed pray to Dow Jones
And check the prices at the gas pump.
Worried that the Safeway may run short
Of toilet paper, beans and Spam
And merchants will hike prices higher
And how will this affect our road trip.

Hoping that the promise holds
Of no boots on that foreign soil
We take our children to the airport
Sending them to Germany  for
Seats along the 50-tank Line
Praying that the game gets called.

People who report the news
All turn the volume up or down:
“It’s just a little foreign scuffle”
Or “Oh my God - it’s World War Three”
Neither of them are on the mark
And we must sort it for ourselves.

And all the while their windows shatter
While rockets flare across their sky
And children who can’t go to school
Must take their naps in subway tunnels,
Cradled by their fearful mothers
While their fathers shoulder guns.

The Great Bear of the East is Hungry
And Ukraine smells like frying pork chops.
ljm