Greetings, and welcome to my "Book Pages".

If by some fantastic, unbelievable coincidence you have stumbled upon my blog, please browse my works of poetry and fiction. One or more of them may offer you a few hours of pleasurable reading.

Here you will find five collections of poems, a collection of related "flash fiction" stories, and a full length novel. Click on the titles to the right to get more details about each title. =======>

Approximately 1050 BCE the ruler of an independent province on the frontier of ancient China named Ji Fa defeated the reigning Emperor Di Xin's vast forces to found China's 3rd dynasty, the Zhou. The rise of the Zhou with their military, scientific, cultural, and economic superiority and their triumph over the Shang dynasty is the subject of this novel.

Cousin Toby and the Preacher and Other Stories is a collection of 11 related "flash fiction" stories set in rural Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, the same location as the recently popularized Robertson clan of Duck Dynasty fame. In fact, I wrote them during the summers of 1973 through 1977 while patrolling as a US Army Corps of Engineers Park Ranger with Phil Roberston himself.

Rejecting the New Millennium is a collection of 33 short poems originally published by CC Marimbo Communications of San Francisco in 1999 as the world teetered on the edge of the dreaded Y2K catastrophe (which never occurred, of course).

A New Kerygma is a collection of 15 poems exploring the roots of culture, at least that part of the American culture I have experienced. The collection was originally published by Bootleg Press / GinMill Productions of Uniondale, NY in 1993

Tribal Magic is a collection of 39 poems inspired by Robert Duncan's axiom, "...the minuet, the game of tennis, the heroic couplet, the concept of form as the imposing of rules and establishing of regularities, the theories of civilization, race, and progress, the performances in science and arts to rationalize the universe, to secure balance and class-- all these are a tribal magic against a real threat of upsets and things not keeping their place."

Humanity's impermanence is explored in this 55 poem collection entitled The Mausoleum on the Levee. Has anyone ever built a mausoleum on a levee? Mausoleums are intended to be the epitome of permanence. Levees also are designed to be the permanent protectors of human artifacts. Therefore, a mausoleum constructed on a levee is twice as permanent as either one is by itself, right?

No less than in our continuing "wars" on poverty, poisonous substances, poly-ethnicisim, and faith, our “free enterprise” obsessed society too often experiences collateral damage. The poems in Commerce of the Undesirable examine the damage, inflicting discomfort on the unwary reader. Hold on to your convictions if you can.