Well, the book is published, and I am waiting for the first proof. Kellie has already made a suggestion about the cover. She does not like that my name is above the title, but I put the words on the back of the hoodie because I was essentially out of blank space on the page. I like how the font almost blends in with the trees and grass of my sketching. We will have to see when the proof gets here. I may change it after I see it. The "BY" seems a little lower in the circle of the hoodie than what I remember. Until the proof gets here though, we are all going to sit and wait--patiently. No, not really patiently.

By the way, the free PDF to JPEG converter I found online mangled the text on the back cover, so I cropped it out. All that is above is the front cover and the spine.

Anyhow, I haven't started a new project yet, but I did have an occasion to complete another verse about the Crow Brothers. As the poem says--and explains--one of the brothers has gone. He has been gone for three weeks now, and I doubt he will return. I did some looking online, and the information in the poem about when crows mate is accurate. I imagine it was his time. Now that I think about it, where does a crow find a mate? I may have to write a verse about that. I'll think on it.

So, for the time being, I will only be writing about TWO Crow brothers. Two will have to do. ENJOY!

A Crow Brother Takes a Wife

For weeks now, two crow brothers

Have been without their third.

I can’t explain what’s happened to

That other black-winged turd.

But he is gone and gone for good,

Not laid up hurt or dead.

The remaining two seem not to have

His memory in their head.

I checked a Corvid research site

Which says crows mate for life

And that it is quite possible

Our brother’s found a wife.

A mature male will seek a spouse

Around the age of four

And leave his family’s nest and land

To find his stock and store.

I suppose I’ve known these crows

For roughly now three years

And should suspect they all will leave

As maturity appears.

So now, it’s me with just the two

Hip-hopping on Knob Hill.

They don’t seem to miss their bro.

I think I probably will.

1. The crow belongs to the Corvidae family which also includes ravens, rooks, magpies, and jays. The Corvus genus includes crows, ravens, and rooks. They are collectively and commonly called Corvids.

Michael Thomas Thoughts on Poetry, Short Stories, Essays, and Ramblings-It's All Here in...

Beauty is the sole legitimate province of the poem.-Edgar Allan Poe

Poetry is when emotion has found its thought and thought has found words--Robert Frost

Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance--Carl Sandburg

I have nothing to say, I am saying it, and that is poetry--John Cage

You will find poetry nowhere unless you bring some of it with you--Joseph Joubert

Poetry is what in a poem makes you laugh, cry, prickle, be silent, makes your toe nails twinkle, makes you want to do this or that or nothing, makes you know that you are alone in the unknown world, that your bliss and suffering is forever shared and forever all your own. ~Dylan Thomas

Waiting on the First Proof And a New Crow Brothers Ditty

A Crow Brother Takes a Wife

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I find that I cannot exist without Poetry--without eternal poetry--half the day will not do--the whole of it--I began with a little, but habit has made me a Leviathan.-John Keats

We do not quite say that the new is more valuable because it fits in; but its fitting in is a test of its value.-T. S. Eliot

A man may praise and praise, but no one recollects but that which pleases.-George Gordon, Lord Byron

The great beauty of poetry is that it makes everything in every place interesting.-John Keats

The purpose of rhythm, it has always seemed to me, is to prolong the moment of contemplation, the moment when we are both asleep and awake, which is the one moment of creation.-W. B. Yeats