I thought I was being clever creating a unique email address for this blog. But then the pandemic hit, my sister died, and I just gave up on some things.

Like the blog.

Like poetry.

So it was a hassle recovering my blog.

And I think I am ready to return to poetry, not that poetry has missed me.

My brother died recently, and I am grieving in a weird way. ANGRY, sad, angry, sad. So angry.

Writing might help.

I am pursuing helping others with literacy growth in a big way, tutoring ESL, GED, and teaching literacy classes–in my retirement. This lets me know how much I value literacy.

My trusty OLD laptop died, and I replaced it right away. This lets me know how much I value literacy.

As I try to recover old documents, I am trying to find more than 1/3 of a MILLION documents created. This lets me know how much I value literacy. As I read some of my poetry and fiction/ nonfiction, I find pieces I want to edit and revise.

I need to get the twitter bashers out of my mind’s eye, for they almost took away my desire to write poetry. Use the wrong word or use the wrong voice and you can be canceled, vilified.

So here’s to grief (again? still?) and a continuing pandemic I’d like to write away. That won’t happen, but perhaps I can find the joy of creation once again if I stop listening to the voices of the poet and poetry bashers who seem to pounce if a wrong word or tone or voice is used, even unwittingly, even when trying to create art. (Persona poems are one of my favorite types.)

And here’s to writing down passwords and email logins somewhere else!

Happy new year, all. And thanks for reading.