A PARABLE FOR FIRST MONDAY, JANUARY Driving home from the warehouse,little jazz on FM, the moon lowand full over the frozen reservoir,a powder polishing the ice. Supposethose lights behind me, gaining,were someone speeding to catch upto tell me I’d forgotten something; not this flatbed rattling pastwith a load of empties.
LINING-OFF THE FIELD My father handed me the flags and paidout string from where he stoodat home, waving me deeper, waving me rightor left, “More left. A little less. Yes.Good.” Then with the string held high,a wind-rolled arcbetween us, I ran hard acrossthe outfield and we set the Left-field flag. Suppose the string were one […]
HOCKSHOP It’s a window next to impossibleto miss unlessyou’re hurrying to a particular placeor obsessed with a recent song, or carryinga face, not just anyone’s,with you at the time. I confess I’ve stood thereunder the sign lettered GUNS – JEWELRY – LOANSmany times, the window full ofrisked, lost, or stolen things,grieving people’s or dead people’s […]
NUDE DESCENDING A PRAYER Father Art, on earth, above those pastthe hours of their deaths, thou Motherunder us for who knows how long now,thy names be with me. Fruit of willsrepeatedly and variously done on earth,who will pray for us? Sinners? I believein clay and constellations and what accidentsallow us to forgive ourselves again for […]
Another from Without Paradise: THE SLOTH I live entirely for my own sake.I once had friends, some money, plans, a love,but what the hell, what difference does it make? These days it doesn’t pay to stay awake.I’ve got what I need. I’ve got nothing to prove.I live entirely for my own sake. I was the […]
It’s been a long time since I posted anything here. I only occasionally repost from another blog or website because I had wanted this to be a place where I would make my own contributions to the “genre” of the weblog. This isn’t the site of my work, either; that’s still my notebook. Having grown […]
I’m very proud to be a small part of Thoughtcast, which Jenny Attiyeh describes as “a watering hole for ideas.” She recorded my reading at The New England Poetry Club on the occasion of my receiving their Sheila Motton Award for best book published in the previous two years. I read with Wendy Mnookin, whose […]
I am incensed by a news article in the Boston Globe today, “Pope to deliver apology to Ireland.” I have seldom seen such a cynical acceptance of the public relations dictum “perception is all.” The article seems to agree that the problem is the Catholic Church’s “image,” and not the worldwide criminal conspiracy recently brought […]
RICHARD HOFFMAN 
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