(These are excerpts—click on the title to view the whole piece!)

Lord Help Us from the Fear of God

Well, to have a war, you need two discernable "sides," with at least one side committed enough, whipped up enough, as it were, to force a conflict the other cannot avoid. I think we're well on our way to developing such a "side."

Tom Dooley

 

Dioscuri

My ghostly grandfathers. The first gurgles. The second pins me with furiously absent stares. He is making his stand. I watch him lose the fight. Again. He is left with anger and without the memory of why. My grandfathers. They are so dead. What do they want?

Stanley Jenkins

 

Church

Then it was on to the sermon. The boy is old—he huffed and puffed, he lost his train of thought—but there was still fire: a holy remnant. He shouted. He pleaded. He waved his Bible like a tear-soaked rag. I couldn't look away... my Christ-haunted ancestors were restless.

Stanley Jenkins

 

Scared (In Memoriam: Bill Woodward)

As an aside, a lot of people seem to have the idea that Buddhism is some sort of otherworldly therapy movement. It ain't, except maybe in California. To begin with, reincarnation is no walk on the beach. Let's talk about the Myth of Sysiphus!

Paul J. Sampson