Last summer I posted a series of poems I produced between 1987-1997 (or there abouts) and tagged them as “Throwback Thursday.” As I shifted my site around, there really wasn’t any home for these poems, so I’ve finally put together a page listing them.

According to stats many still get quite a bit of traffic, so that’s pretty cool. I wanted new people to get a chance to read them, so take the poetry link at the top of my site or just click below:

http://www.ronearl.com/poems

Hope you enjoy. Maybe I’ll get back in the mood and write a poem or two again.

Today is National Poetry Day. Also it’s Thursday. And sadly today was also the memorial of my childhood friend’s father, Donald C. Best. I didn’t know Mr. Best well, but I hung out at his house plenty during my grade school years. They had the best basement with model trains and race cars, everything a yong boy would want. He was a good man, friendly and helpful. My memories of him are all positive.

At the memorial Brent, my friend, gave a eulogy and it brought back so many good memories or as Brent said, “build new memories.” It put me in mind of a poem I wrote after the death of my great grandmother. In death we are reminded of life.

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Well folks, this is the last Throwback Thursday. No more, unless I find another stash of lost works. So I guess I can’t say never, but pretty close.

There are other poems, but most that are left are derivative of the ones I posted.

Tonight’s poem started out as a homage to Walt Witman’s “Song of Myself” and then it took a detour. This is also a published piece, or so I was told. My mother had taken it to work and a co-worker liked enough that she asked if she could put it in her newsletter for the local chapter of the NAACP. I was flattered obviously. Pretty fly for a white guy.

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