ducks jump off a ledge,
bobbing once in pond water,
and drift onward.
Bobbing Ducks [Haiku]
Reply
Ignorance is Bliss [Lyric Poem]
A turtle swims to water's edge,
and finds before him a steep bluff.
He makes himself a solemn pledge,
"I'll scale this cliff, however tough!"
Struggling over the toilsome rim,
he sees another wall of stone
stands just ahead - tormenting him.
"Just one more, I'll not piss and moan."
If he could know that it was stairs,
He'd have some turtle curse words to share.
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
Soggy [Haiku]
fallen leaves, post-rain:
gauge the drizzle by
what crunch remains.
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
DAILY PHOTO: St. Louis Cathedral by Day
Image
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
PROMPT: Mission
Shhh! It’s a secret. And the first rule of secret missions is you don’t talk about the secret mission.
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
Autumn Grasshopper [Tanka]
climbing grasshopper
clings to gently bouncing branch;
sure to fall
before the next crunchy leaf
succumbs to Autumn breezes.
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
Great Egret [Haiku]
DAILY PHOTO: Bayou Raccoons
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
BOOK: “Wildness” by Lydia Willsky-Ciollo
Wildness: Henry David Thoreau and the Making of an American Theology by Lydia Willsky-CiolloMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher — University of Notre Dame Press
Release Date: March 1, 2026
Willsky-Ciollo argues in this book that Thoreau built a uniquely American theology with nature at its core, a theology that didn’t just draw on Greco-Roman philosophy and Abrahamic religion (as other schools of thought have) but also on Indian ideas of both the South Asian and Native American varieties. (The book speaks more extensively to the latter.)
For a scholarly work, this book is readable and doesn’t require jargon proficiency or any special academic background. I can’t say I found it compelling to think of Thoreau’s teachings as a theology (rather than a philosophy, or a strain of Transcendentalism.) That said, to someone outside the field, I don’t think that is a particularly interesting question, given that scholarly disciplines are inherently subjectively defined and prone to mutability. What’s more important to me is that I did gain numerous insights from this book, particularly regarding Thoreau’s unfinished final work Wild Fruits (which is discussed in some detail,) and Thoreau’s views on American Indians and their influence on his worldview.
If you’re interested in Thoreau, and looking for some insight that one might not gain from reading his most well-known works, this is a book well worth reading.
View all my reviews
Share on Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc.
PROMPT: Long Life
Daily writing prompt
What are your thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?
Living a long life while physically and mentally capable = great. Living a long life when you need advanced technology to achieve it and you’re just lying around like a slug without the ability hold a simple conversation = the worst circle of hell I can fathom.
One of the few books I’d recommend for everyone is Atul Gawande’s “Being Mortal” which shows that our great pride in increasing human life expectancy is not all it’s cracked up to be because the average quality of life at death has dropped in the process. Essentially, people are completing the marathon because we are dragging quasi-corpses over the finish line rather than allowing them to fail gracefully.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 