Also! PMRP the Podcast!
01/18/24 12:28
You can occasionally hear my voice among the crowd at the Post-Meridian Radio Players.
And now you don't have to schlep to some random place in Somerville, MA to hear all the things they've done over the years!
Behold, PMRP: The Podcast! Published bi-weekly, and (very) occasionally featuring yours truly.
And now you don't have to schlep to some random place in Somerville, MA to hear all the things they've done over the years!
Behold, PMRP: The Podcast! Published bi-weekly, and (very) occasionally featuring yours truly.
Not much scribbling these days...
01/18/24 12:08
…Not that I feel ready to share with anyone. But an entry nonetheless, of a sort.
I've mentioned elsewhere that occasionally I get invited to write something for Reviewed. Well, perhaps to their regret, they asked me once again.
My review, published today, of Good Counsel
Thank you to Anthony Papillarambil for all his work wrangling my words into a readable format, and to Tim Renzi for TRYING to make me look good on camera. (A Herculean feat, but he made the best of what *gestures to body* THIS offered him to work with.)
I've mentioned elsewhere that occasionally I get invited to write something for Reviewed. Well, perhaps to their regret, they asked me once again.
My review, published today, of Good Counsel
Thank you to Anthony Papillarambil for all his work wrangling my words into a readable format, and to Tim Renzi for TRYING to make me look good on camera. (A Herculean feat, but he made the best of what *gestures to body* THIS offered him to work with.)
Four years gone…
02/27/23 12:00
…And I am back again. Well, was.
A whole lot has changed since I was last "properly" onstage. I had a stroke (yay!) which put me mostly out of commission for a year. Then, just as I was about to get back in the saddle, in March off 2020, SOMETHING happened that put the kibosh on that. The last three years have seen, if not the destruction of Boston-area theater, at the very least a HUGE struggle for it to stay viably afloat, to the point where even some institutions I thought would never go away in my lifetime, are in the process of dissolving…
All that is not to say I've done NOTHING creative in the past four years. Performances with the Post-Meridian Radio Players, unusual gigs for History Alive!, a last-minute call-up for a filmed staging of Phoebe Roberts's Gentlemen Never Tell, as well as other projects in the works, and occasional pecking at my own middling efforts (though nothing to show for it at present).
But this was the first time, in over four years, that I felt fully back onstage. It felt good. Not floods of tears, oh-my-God-I-missed-you-so-muhuhuuuuuch good, but it did feel...right. Here's hoping it's not another four years before I make it back in front of people again.
A whole lot has changed since I was last "properly" onstage. I had a stroke (yay!) which put me mostly out of commission for a year. Then, just as I was about to get back in the saddle, in March off 2020, SOMETHING happened that put the kibosh on that. The last three years have seen, if not the destruction of Boston-area theater, at the very least a HUGE struggle for it to stay viably afloat, to the point where even some institutions I thought would never go away in my lifetime, are in the process of dissolving…
All that is not to say I've done NOTHING creative in the past four years. Performances with the Post-Meridian Radio Players, unusual gigs for History Alive!, a last-minute call-up for a filmed staging of Phoebe Roberts's Gentlemen Never Tell, as well as other projects in the works, and occasional pecking at my own middling efforts (though nothing to show for it at present).
But this was the first time, in over four years, that I felt fully back onstage. It felt good. Not floods of tears, oh-my-God-I-missed-you-so-muhuhuuuuuch good, but it did feel...right. Here's hoping it's not another four years before I make it back in front of people again.
"The most awkward thing..."
04/23/21 22:48
The most awkward thing
Was the fact that I
Kept looking at you
That’s how I knew
That you
Never really looked at me
Except once
When I kindly caught you
In the fact that you
Had stopped talking to me
And were just talking
And all it took was my wry
“Fair enough”
For you to notice
Look
Lock eyes for the first time
Blush as I teased you with a glance
And laugh, awkwardly
At which point we
Kindly excused ourselves
From one another
To go forth and try again
With someone else
Was the fact that I
Kept looking at you
That’s how I knew
That you
Never really looked at me
Except once
When I kindly caught you
In the fact that you
Had stopped talking to me
And were just talking
And all it took was my wry
“Fair enough”
For you to notice
Look
Lock eyes for the first time
Blush as I teased you with a glance
And laugh, awkwardly
At which point we
Kindly excused ourselves
From one another
To go forth and try again
With someone else
"You have an apple face..."
12/01/20 22:21
You have an apple face
I don't know how better to describe it
I like your apple features, the crispness of them
I like your short, sharp apple laugh
Please understand me, this is not a come-on
I'm not saying I want to eat your face
Not comparing you to forbidden fruit
Non, Magritte, ceci n'est pas une pomme, vraiment
And yet I take joy in regarding you
Your brown apple hair pulled tight against your scalp
Your dark apple eyes set deep
Behind brown apple cheeks
And I will never tell you this
Not any part of it, I think
I will simply revel in the fact
That you exist, oblivious to what you are
Apple-faced woman
Unique in my perception
I don't know how better to describe it
I like your apple features, the crispness of them
I like your short, sharp apple laugh
Please understand me, this is not a come-on
I'm not saying I want to eat your face
Not comparing you to forbidden fruit
Non, Magritte, ceci n'est pas une pomme, vraiment
And yet I take joy in regarding you
Your brown apple hair pulled tight against your scalp
Your dark apple eyes set deep
Behind brown apple cheeks
And I will never tell you this
Not any part of it, I think
I will simply revel in the fact
That you exist, oblivious to what you are
Apple-faced woman
Unique in my perception
"And you said..."
10/30/20 22:01
And you said
"Let me know
If you need anything"
And I, with longing
Long suppressed
Replied "I will"
But you and I know
What I meant was
"I won't, not ever again"
We've both been wounded
Too many times for that
And I lived
And you lived
And you likely didn't think of me
Once in those two weeks
And that's okay
But sometimes
In the dark
Against my will
I'm there again
Laughing with you
In the corner
Thinking that
Maybe
Just maybe
You're the one
And that…
That will always hurt
"Let me know
If you need anything"
And I, with longing
Long suppressed
Replied "I will"
But you and I know
What I meant was
"I won't, not ever again"
We've both been wounded
Too many times for that
And I lived
And you lived
And you likely didn't think of me
Once in those two weeks
And that's okay
But sometimes
In the dark
Against my will
I'm there again
Laughing with you
In the corner
Thinking that
Maybe
Just maybe
You're the one
And that…
That will always hurt
A note regarding older entries
01/02/20 12:00
The dates of everything past this point are often questionable, and sometimes flat out wrong. I've owned a number of computers across the time period covered, and some of the creation dates changed as I re-saved a piece of writing in a new / more stable format. The dates reflect the last known creation date I had available. Everything with a title in quotes never had a title to begin with, and many of those lack definite writing dates as well. The previous four, for instance, were all almost certainly written before New Years Day, possibly years before. I didn't keep track… So take them with a grain of salt!
"It will be better..."
01/01/20 19:41
It will be better
Science has proven it
If you sit down, pen in hand
And tell yourself, "Self,
It will be better,"
Then as sure as oxygen loves hydrogen
As sure as the stars burning in space
It must, mathematically, improve
You will not believe this, naturally
The unreconstructed lizard
At the base of your skull
Can no more comprehend the cosmos
Than a toad can tell you the time
And only through force and practice
Can the thinky bits behind your brow
Maintain your grip on reality and tell you
It will be better
It will be better
Believe you, me, It will be better
Science has proven it
If you sit down, pen in hand
And tell yourself, "Self,
It will be better,"
Then as sure as oxygen loves hydrogen
As sure as the stars burning in space
It must, mathematically, improve
You will not believe this, naturally
The unreconstructed lizard
At the base of your skull
Can no more comprehend the cosmos
Than a toad can tell you the time
And only through force and practice
Can the thinky bits behind your brow
Maintain your grip on reality and tell you
It will be better
It will be better
Believe you, me, It will be better
"The street reminded me of the night..."
01/01/20 19:32
The street reminded me of the night
When you, the other one, smiled
And called me an idiot until I kissed you
And it all went up and downhill from there
Locked above ground, hiding behind lattices
Cat's paws, curses, and Spanish wine
We talked of expiration and expatriation
And the first of many too long goodbyes
Both deluded that we were free
And now I pass the brick wall
That means you and your cigarettes
And it burns the truth hard in my head
That I am not now and maybe never ready
For what comes next
Because your mess matched my mess
And we could both stare
At each other's ugly bits
Without blinking
When you, the other one, smiled
And called me an idiot until I kissed you
And it all went up and downhill from there
Locked above ground, hiding behind lattices
Cat's paws, curses, and Spanish wine
We talked of expiration and expatriation
And the first of many too long goodbyes
Both deluded that we were free
And now I pass the brick wall
That means you and your cigarettes
And it burns the truth hard in my head
That I am not now and maybe never ready
For what comes next
Because your mess matched my mess
And we could both stare
At each other's ugly bits
Without blinking
"I'll rust in this light..."
01/01/20 19:26
I'll rust in this light
All my pale iron crumbling, red, brittle
Missing the cool oilcloth rain
That always kept me safe
From corrosive plasma playing on my skin
Like a toddler with a toy train
Seeing how big a bang he can make
I reach down and rip up dandelions
No change since I was three
Marveling at the welling white milk
Tearing away the leafy green cap
Until my hand is filled
With feathery yellow confetti
Which I let the wind scatter for a
Brief beautiful flight before
Vanishing in the grass
Anything
To avoid doing the dishes
All my pale iron crumbling, red, brittle
Missing the cool oilcloth rain
That always kept me safe
From corrosive plasma playing on my skin
Like a toddler with a toy train
Seeing how big a bang he can make
I reach down and rip up dandelions
No change since I was three
Marveling at the welling white milk
Tearing away the leafy green cap
Until my hand is filled
With feathery yellow confetti
Which I let the wind scatter for a
Brief beautiful flight before
Vanishing in the grass
Anything
To avoid doing the dishes