Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Reading is shared interaction
between a writer of text and a
literate interpreter of that text.

A writer creates meaning through
selection of specific textual code.
A reader extracts meaning from that code
by creation of assumed mental images.

A writer provides transmission of meaning,
based on concepts central to one perspective.
A reader provides interpretation of meaning,
based on prior subject knowledge and a personal
world view possibly central to another perspective.

Both methods are imperfect, insofar as a writer
can never account for missing information nor an
altered perception on the part of any specific reader;
and a reader can never presume to be able to recreate
with exactitude the meaning a writer sought to convey.

Reading is an ongoing process of active,
never passive, compromise of meaning.


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Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) living in Southern California. Like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, he believes that the instant contains eternity

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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It matters!

For if a soul is damned to hell,
may it pass terminal velocity at
thirty-two feet per second per second,
or is a soul limited, as if it were of
some discrete mass subject to
universals of gravity and momentum?

Again, if bound for some heaven,
is a soul encumbered by attaining
escape velocity in order to rest in
peace among the stars? Then,
if of no mass, a soul is not limited
to traveling below the speed of light,

But may roam galaxies without number
as pure energy, not to be frozen in place by
entropy at a terminal death of this one universe,
or collapse many souls into a singularity!


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Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) living in Southern California. Like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, he believes that the instant contains eternity

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

- -
Acres of hummocked hillside
strewn with granite and marble;
faded dates, Portuguese names,
some whole families, males, three generations
lost to the querulous sea they’d harvested daily.

Years upon years of heartbreaking toil at sea, while
waiting ashore broke the hearts of their women.

Empty graves for most as the sea
seldom gives up what it takes away;
the deep trench off Monterey Bay hides
more secrets than all the sardines ever canned.

Stone memorials for those who
haunt the shore when surf closes
down the bar into Moss Landing
and window shades are drawn
against the howling of the dead, as
widows rock endlessly in the dark.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) living in Southern California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity.

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Evil, dark-brown snake-tangle,
some as thick as your thumb,
naked and bleak in the winter sun,
yearning to regulate the inner fire.

Balled atop an arbor pole
champagne grape vines
await season’s change without
shedding, emerald skin appears.

Blossoms, buds, orbs of
clear tang, bursting from
tangles to be plucked and savored,
sumptuous bulbs of sugared venom.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) living in Southern California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity.

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Waking each morning, still-life, still asleep.

Slowly, agonizingly, massaging it,
drawing blood of day back to the surface.

Tingles of self-satisfaction indicate
the Big Sleep has not yet arrived.

Creeping pain waxes throughout
emotional nerve endings as ebbs the
intoxicating numbness of night.


Dead leaves swim across the surface of the pond
obscuring red, gold and cream flashes;
flecks radiate from unseen mossy depths,
break cover, snatch insect mouthfuls, then sink
beneath the safety of parti-colored leaf flotsam, patiently.


Ahoy! Decadent Rimbaud’s drunken boat sails again,
joy comes to those on the quay who salute adieu,
but you, lunatic-tocking away, still wait for sun.

Steep waters heaped high above,
deep thoughts beckon from far below,
fair wind lost and family mates cast asunder,
only prey now for the family few left lashed tight,
daring piratical advisors let go their night moorings.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school teacher (remember the hormonally-challenged?) living in Southern California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity.

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Masses of humanity,
bubbling crust of society’s
foundation and bedrock
on which elitism tramples.

Smoldering anger
created by hypocrisy,
stench of semantics
used to control others.

Heed the admonition:
adversity can be a teacher,
with a whip and a club,
or a kiss and a prayer.

Socially unchained, literally,
life lessons are unchanged;
learned helplessness is still
too universal to ignore.

You have become grasping,
gasping, gripping the Western fact –
your aspirations are worthwhile,
if you just stay in my shadow.

Animal perseverance –
human hunger for survival.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher living in Southern California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large and the instant contains eternity.

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Washing the feet of the sinner and sinned,
not able to tell the one from the other.

A good thing I say, as you never know
if truly forgiven or just needing to give.

Never knowing whom you meet, as they say,
what has been done or whence they may go.

What is received should also be given,
that which is given also will be received.

Suspicion is not the cloak you should wear,
but a raiment of trust for the life up ahead.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large, and that the instant contains eternity.

Contributor: Richard Hartwell

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Morning pine whiff, sun-warmed pinesap,
spiced nostrils, aroused, alert, erect;
fresh-baked bread would be no match.

Fountain’s call, gilded-fish splashes,
syncopated waterfall backbeat;
ears lightly titillated by liquid allegro.

Soft zephyr, arm hairs whisked into
pleasure-shaking goose bumps;
ablutions bestowed by blowback spray.

Dandelion stem plucked and sucked,
transport to times lost, miles trod;
tongue-tasted sweet and tart memories.

Turtledoves glimpsed atop the wall, two,
spied a third, shunned, wooing a mate,
only empty nest’s bitter greetings remain.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large, and that the instant contains eternity.