Journaling in Verse

Is your body ready for the poetry version of Bo Burnham’s Inside? 

Kind of an unfortunate tag-line, to be honest, but I couldn’t help that we had very similar ideas and he executed first and stuck the landing freakin’ beautifully.

Anyway, I just published that poetry collection! I wrote the Journaling in Verse trilogy one poem a day starting in March of 2020 when there were only about 100 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States. 

The first book, Global Pandemic, covers my initial shock and horror. Buy it if you want to fondly look back on the great TP Panic and many of us going through our first confrontation with our own mortality.

The second book is World on Fire, and I get pretty political in this one. Most of it was written under the tangerine glow of California’s toxic Summer ash cloud. And it shows.

The third book, New Normal, is all about how I recovered from the Trauma, found my tribe, got my shots and ultimately initiated myself into the woo. Here’s a sample from Part III:

Day 221

She told me her heartburn was serious;

    Sent me to get her ice cream.

Her whimper was far from imperious… 

    Motives were secret though: more than they seemed.

I come back to candles and wine glasses;

    RuPaul queued up on TV.

Her lingerie, hinted at, bypasses

    Minuscule hopes I had, smiting me, clean.

I’d figured this year’s anniversary 

    Held little chance to be sweet.

With plague and the crazy world, cursory

    Surveys of options suggested defeat.

Uncertainty burned off me instantly

    Cuddled up close on the couch

The dozens of tiny flames flickering

    Heating our bubble: our safe little house.

You don’t need to get all three, by any means. Grab whichever one you feel most drawn to, they all meet my highest standard of melody, rhythm, rhyme, metaphor and humor! You could call me a Woke Dr. Suess.

 Actually please do call me that… Words of Affirmation are my Love Language. Write it in an Amazon Review, perhaps!