A few days after my last post, an illegal war of impulsive, mercurial volition was launched on the country of Iran by the mob boss …
Put ICE on ice!
Friday afternoon in what was a cold winter day in the Pacific Northwest, we took our newly-painted signs and caught the Yellow light rail over by New Seasons in Arbor Lodge. We headed downtown where we joined the throngs of other stalwarts at a protest in front of the Hilton Hotel. The Hilton brand has been allowing the paramilitary thugs of CPB and ICE to stay in their assorted hotels. Boycotts have been called for; we just switched a number of our travel reservations for a March trip Back East.
Feels Like A Year (Or Maybe a Century?) Lived in a Single Week
That about hits the nail on the head—bingo and then some. Twelve days into a new calendar year and the de-compensating, dementia-addled narcissist-in-chief starts a war. A few days later, his thugs on the snow street of Minneapolis, Minnesota murder a woman in cold blood. More rattling of sabers and spewing of gaslit diatribes 24/7 since then
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We Are All Frog…
We joined the parade on Saturday afternoon in downtown Portland. The chickens and the turkey, the SpongeBob and Pokemon characters, the giraffes and cows and unicorns, the T-rexes and, of course, the frogs. All 40 or 50,000 of us with our homemade signs, with our bubble machines, drums, cowbells, streaming for miles, a crowd so dense we were able to fill two bridges cross the Willamette River and returning at the same time. Even if the front page of the New York Times continues to downplay these mass protest events
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Publication News: Burn It Down!
The Autumn 2025 “Burn It Down” issue of TrashLight has hit the streets. My poem, “Rewind,” appears along with many other voices in its eighty-plus pages of art, fiction, and poetry. All of this creativity is a call to action, to rise up and rage against the would-be fascist machine that threatens our country 24/7 these days. TrashLight Editor-in-Chief Jill Spinelli has these words to add to the conversation: “This issue is built from the broken screams for justice, the need to be seen, and the feral desire to fight back…
Greetings from War-Ravaged Portland!
Where there are free bouquets available for passersby on their way to and from Alberta Park. Where there are no fires that I can see, no conflagrations, no insurrectionists warring in the streets. Where the sun is out and it is a glorious autumn day iridescent with green, melodious with birdsong, peaceful and calm and serene. And since I know that the tyrants are lying and gaslighting about what is currently going on here—in the city where I live—makes a person wonder why one would ever take anything they utter at face value let alone assume it is telling the truth
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Publication Day: America’s Slide Towards Authoritarianism from IHRAM Press
I took the above photograph at the No Kings Rally and March in downtown Portland, Oregon on June 14, 2025. It was one of my favorite signs at the march—after all, we are avid community gardeners! I had previously seen it at the April 5, 2025 Hands Off Rally but did not get a good photograph at the time. It sums up so much about this moment we find ourselves in. Luckily, IHRAM Press and its authors and artists are fighting back. I am one of those authors. As of today, October 1st, IHRAM Press is publishing America’s Slide Towards Authoritarianism, a folio of American and international writers and artists…
Nothing to Celebrate Today…
After this shameful week in the United States Senate, later in the House of Representatives, and today when Felon 47 takes out his Sharpie and scrawls his illegible nonsense on a bill that should never have been sanctioned let alone. Instead, give a listen to a reading of this scathing speech by the Honorable Frederick Douglass, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” as orated by his descendants. Douglass delivered this speech to the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York on July 5, 1852. So much of what he speaks to is tragically still relevant today…
Call It By Its Name
The photo on this post is of one oh-so-lovely blossom from one of the three snow leaf hydrangeas that grace our front yard. The simple beauty of flowers, of the green inspiration that surrounds me here in my little corner of Portland, Oregon paradise is sorely needed right about now. I took this snapshot yesterday when I was deeply in pursuit of beauty…
“We don’t want your Nazi cars / take a one-way trip to Mars.”
This bro/ligarch is definitely un-liked. A thousand people (maybe more) were calling out his evildoing and enabling down on South Macadam Avenue across from the Tesla dealership today. We joined them earlier and it was, overall, definitely cathartic…
