It’s turned into a hot summer after all, catching up after a long, slow, cold spring. I’ve found the days slipping away from me once again, as I turned my attention to other responsibilities, and I’ve scarcely entered a new post here since my birthday. But now it’s nearly September, and as I find myself longing for...

Dandelions are the anarchists of the garden. I’ve loved them since I was a child back in the seventies, when everyone else in the neighborhood thought they were an annoying little weed, spoiling the emerald green lawns they worked so hard to maintain. I could never understand that. How could anyone not love their...

I wrote the poem below, previously published in a local community newsletter, a few years ago, before COVID. It has a poignant feel for me now, looking back across the summers since then, as the city has slowly made its way through a stop-and-start recovery and reopening. I’ve never really liked hot weather in general,...

City skies are always at their most fine in the winter. It’s a strange thing, a silver lining of sorts, star-gazing in New York. It’s often easier, in some ways, than in dark-sky country – the few stars and planets bright enough to be seen stand out against a bare, inky background, making constellations...

"What was it like? Growing up in the city of the Ancestors, Rodney?".... (Stargate Atlantis 1.16, "The Brotherhood") .... I can't quite remember just when it was that these lines began to haunt me.......