A Momentary Taste of Being

Anyone interested in taking a look at my new novel, Beyond the Rim of Space ?  Right now we have the e-file available and if  you're willing to tackle an e-book, I'd be happy to send it to you--just ask that you post a review on Lulu and/or Amazon (when it eventually trickles its way through the Amazon bureaucracy to emerge as a Kindle book. Oh, and for those kind enough to take a look at this blog from time to time, the alternative cover:  We had several while in the works, and the one above is the one--for a variety of reasons, that we settled on--but each had its merits.  Enjoy!

Some may have wondered to whence I had vanished lo! these long days; and I truly do wish to come back and begin more regular review of the literary (and not so literary) world. But I have been away preparing for this, my first full book-length fiction publication:   Beyond the Rim of Light . A collaborative venture between another writer and me, it has been many years in the making.  You can read an excerpt of it here . E-file versions should be ready for Amazon Kindle and available through Amazon shortly. You might also wish to check into the Facebook Author Page for Alex Stone , where I will be making feeble attempts to keep everyone updated as I work on the sequel and on two novel-length projects of my own. Hope to be back reviewing once I can return to the rhythm of things.

Saying so long to Irene with a sigh of relief and a prayer for those in the path--especially family members and Jane A poem

Ascension, Water, and Raw Beauty

"At the Heart of the Heart of Me"

Eight poems (or more)  at ". . . recollected in tranquility. . ."

Three poems at  ". . . recollected in tranquility. . . "

Inspired by a recent post at Shelf Love, I took in hand once again Hemingway's most deliberately poetic book, A Moveable Feast and share with you a transcription on one passage that recasts the prose to make of it more of a poetic shape. From A Moveable Feast: The Restored Edition Ernest Hemingway Original: I knew several of the men who fished the fruitful parts of the Seine between the Île St. Louis and the Square du Vert Galent and sometimes, if the day was bright, I would buy a liter of wine and a piece of bread and some sausage and sit in the sun and read one of the books I had bought and watch the fishing. Recast--still all of Hemingway's words: I knew several of the men who fished the fruitful parts of the Seine between the Île St. Louis and the Square du Vert Galent and sometimes, if the day was bright, I would buy a liter of wine and a piece of bread and some sausage and sit in the sun and read one of the books I had bought and watch the fishing....

Meander Plain It's amazing the way you work and shape and then let lie fallow and wait, and find that there is yet more shaping and moving to do.

Food Adventures in Asia Mini sequence

Boston Cobblestones A Litany of Miracles

What We Mean When We Say God is Father If you're interested or inclined to, please join me as I entertain this question in a systematically unsystematic fashion.  At least I'll start and we'll see where we get.

Reflecting on a title for a piece that is rumbling around in my head , I came upon this lovely poem. Gilbert Bécaud COMME UN SOUFFLE FRAGILE Comme un souffle fragile Ta Parole se donne Comme un vase d'argile Ton amour nous façonne. Ta Parole est murmure Comme un secret d'amour Ta Parole est blessure Qui nous ouvre le jour Ta Parole est naissance Comme on sort de prison Ta Parole est semence Qui promet la moisson. Ta Parole est partage Comme on coupe du pain Ta Parole est passage Qui nous dit un chemin. Because this is new to me, I won't venture the damage of a translation but you can try the google translator and see what you get--there doesn't appear to be a lot of colloquialisms or idiosyncratic usages. What the heck--let me give a bit of a try at least: As a Fragile Breath As a fragile breath Your word is given As a clay vase Your love shapes us. Your word is a murmur Like love's secret Your word is a wound That opens our da...

At . . . recollected in tranquility. . .

Two revisions requiring more revision- -but you take them out of the drawer, shake them out, dust them off, pick off a thread or two and look at them for a while in a new context.  Could be you need to get rid of them, give them away, could be that these are the ones you'll work on.  Context helps.

A summary of a key theme in poetry of leaden circles

already know, and I burden the rest of you by making the point--but new material at ". . . recollected in tranquility. . . "

Two poems: ("The Big Drop") at ". . . recollected in tranquility. . . "("Oriskany Sandstone")

Working through the journals and gathered remnants last night, I came upon a poem of which I had no recollection whatsoever.  That is indeed a rare delight--normally I have some sense of it, some idea that it exists.  But not so with "The Four Loves"  present for those who care to make the journey.

One inspired by St. Augustine (the person, not the place) And one about my personal foibles, which seem to drive everyone mad.