I unzip my jacket and unwind my scarf, the ends of which kiss the subway car floor. My mask contracts and expands over my nose and beard as I hunt for my breath. It is January, but I am hot and sick and don’t want to stand on a crowded train. The car jolts from…
Category: Winter
Avarice
Precious is you.Jade, ruby, amber opals.A fiend tugs within.
Heavy water
Eight point three pounds. Gallons upon gallons. Displace me now.
Dawns
The one word to learn. In any tongue is thank you. Rising from your bunk.
Let This Vessel Rest
I touched her hull but she barely twitched. “I am tired, hurt, and scared,” she said in a rattled whisper.
She was weighed down by generations of neglect and good intentions. She wanted to it all to be over, to be put to rest. The ice in the Hudson heard her and tried to help, only to be plucked from obliviation by good intentions once again.
Sailboat Sourdough Winter Bread
Bread baking on a sailboat is more efficient using packaged yeast than maintaining a sourdough starter. But if you are looking for efficiency, you are probably not particularly interested in sailing either.
Emergence
Warmer is the dawn. Still low and south though you are. Sullen chaste for now.
Changing The Subject
In the last few weeks, every conversation started with the wind and cold, moved to the President’s tweets, before returning to the cold and the wind.
But there is hope.
When A Gallon Becomes More Than a Gallon
Someone noticed that diesel had accumulated in an area of my boat where the fuel tanks vents. This does not typically happen when I fill up. So what could cause that? How could a tank be full in the evening and subsequently overflow?
I blame the cold.
Weighted Coin: Spare a Dollar
I once passed out, drunk, resting my head on the curb outside a gas station. I was kicked awake by a Sheriff’s deputy. He sent me home after I explained that I was just waiting for the store to open so I could buy a pack of cigarettes. He could have bundled me into the back…