drmstream[writing]

  I know a man who was once the youngest river boat cap­tain on the Mis­sis­sippi.  He’s old now and has moved from the uncar­ing whimsy of the great river to the end­less expanse of the Atlantic Ocean.  On a high shelf in his small bed­room he keeps a neat row of hard-backed note­books.  These […]

They were pulled in by the forces of Jupiter, a potent wind of ambi­tion and oblig­a­tion, less noble than immor­tal, God-like and unwit­ting. They brought the dif­fer­ences of dis­tant uni­verses: the cool dis­may of icy beauty, the clutch­ing grasp of fer­tile loins. They were bound by the rude com­mon­al­ity of oth­ers’ blood: the stains left […]

Peb­bles   Every­thing, every­where, a memo­r­ial seen from the cor­ner of my eye; a puz­zle piece, a part of a recon­struc­tion, a mem­ory. A mes­sage – I am still here with you, for you. Like a spy, I read code left in a news­pa­per or flash­ing past on a com­puter mon­i­tor, rec­og­niz­able only to me.   I carry a peb­ble in […]

You could tell when he got up to the podium that he had seen some­thing that he couldn’t leave behind, that time had stopped and he was claw­ing at it. He was the last speaker for the night. He wasn’t pol­ished. His hair was uneven, plas­tered on his fore­head by a layer of sweat. The suit […]

He was a vio­lent man inca­pable of being faith­ful ton his wife. He was also para­noid. Those qual­i­ties doomed their mar­riage. Feb­ru­ary 17, 2011 6:19 pm via Twit­te­la­torReplyRetweetFavorite @drmstream drm­stream When you tell a story on Twit­ter, you assem­ble it into 140 char­ac­ter or fewer bits and dis­trib­ute it into the stream.  It is different […]

It starts sim­ply, in sep­a­rate places. The seed takes root.  It winds through the soil search­ing for mois­ture. The trunk sprouts soft and vul­ner­a­ble, then its hard case stiff­ens as the cold wind, bit­ing rain, steamy sun buf­fet it. The tree grows. Across the path, another tree grows too. Both trees spread their boughs wide, present […]

In the 10 years since my dad died, my life has changed in ways nei­ther of us antic­i­pated. I want to turn toward new things with him today. Decem­ber 6, 2010 3:19 pm via Twit­te­la­torReplyRetweetFavorite @Kcecelia Kather­ine Cecelia This day before Christ­mas is filled with antic­i­pa­tion and uncer­tainty. The gifts are assem­bled, the rit­u­als lined […]

My father was always the last guy to buy a Christ­mas tree.  He explained that the prices were cheap­est the day before Christ­mas.  He didn’t dwell on how bad the selec­tion was. So we’d be dri­ving along the coun­try roads a day or two before Christ­mas, look­ing for a tree stand that was still open and […]

Selma could hear Patty’s breath slow, and then heard her begin to cry again.  Finally, she felt her friend’s pain, could imag­ine it as if it were her own.  What would I want to hear a friend say, Selma thought to her­self.  At the same instant, she thought to her­self, I’m not ever going to […]

Ten years later, Rose and Selma would talk about Nathan’s funeral when they sat in the chill kitchen, Rose’s boys asleep, the street sounds muted.  They recalled the Rabbi’s words of admo­ni­tion to the hun­dred or so peo­ple who had gath­ered deep in Mt. Zion Ceme­tery.  “Don’t take the dreams away from a dreamer, because […]