Hi, thanks for checking up on me and staying with me. I have been working on a new book, Ball of String, which will be available for purchase in the next week. I have also totally revamped my website which will be in place next week and will be found at the old address, www.snapscreenpress.org.

While the website will have all the info on Ball of String, I want to describe it a little here. BOS has fifty poems and corresponding photos. Ten of the poems were prize winners and the others are all ones I love and fit with the general theme of the book.

The book is about the many ways that we are all connected in our journeys through life and our experiences on this beautiful planet. We are all connected by our genes or the many other interdependent parts that life on this planet demands.

The advance reviews on the book have been wonderful and all are available on the website.
I hope you will take the time to read them and the sample poems I have included.
In the future I plan to be making comments on this blog fairly frequently and I hope you will log on and say hi.

I welcome feedback at Glenn.snapscreen@gmail.com or on the website where I have included an easy way to contact me.

Best regards,
Glenn

Hi

Just checking in to let you know that this site will be retained and added to in the future. I am currently working on publishing a new collection of poems and photos and will be at a
manuscript conference in Vermont this weekend.
Glenn

The following post was also published in the Concord Monitor on 5/17/18

I have been watching the slow but steady demise of the Boy Scouts of America and as an  Eagle Scout of this former organization, I have decided to write a sad goodbye to an institution that played a major role in helping me grow up.

The new organization, the Scouts of America, no longer caters exclusively to boys and their change of approach marks the last of the major organizations that worked strictly with boys and young teens in their formative years. (Yes, I am aware that Explorers and Sea Scouts have been coed for years but they cater to an older group of Scouts).

There are many coed organizations that provide wonderful services to children and teens and I commend them on the great work that they do. And there are many organizations that still work strictly with girls and young women. But I think we are leaving many young boys to fend for themselves in the difficult task of learning how to be functioning young men in our society. What they learn on the streets or filtered through a coed screen, will not necessarily completely serve them in adult life. 

The Boy Scouts was a life-changing organization for me. They provided me and many others with scholarships to attend a camp where we learned about teamwork, living in the outdoors, swimming, life saving and many other skills. I learned from counselors and cabin mates, and was able to talk frankly with others about the very confusing aspects of the transition to adulthood.

I am saddened to see that the Boy Scouts of America no longer exists. Generations of young men grew up learning about the need to be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind and many other positive traits. New generations will be taught other things by a nation that seems to no longer value these qualities. For years Hollywood has been denigrating what it means to be caring and honest, using the term “boy scout” to tag someone as clueless and impotent. Well, it has finally taken hold. We have trashed them out of existence.

Even though I am sure the new coed organization will do its best to help develop good citizens, its role will be very different. The pendulum has swung in recent years to dismissing men’s and boy’s organizations as unnecessary to our culture. Somehow young men are expected to have all the answers just by the act of growing up, while young women, who mature much earlier than boys, are expected to be helpless in dealing with the new world. That attitude is not good for either sex. I sincerely hope the trend doesn’t continue to the point that the many young women’s organizations also disappear. Adolescents of both sexes often need time and space to figure things out.

We need to pay attention to the special needs of boys who are facing a very confusing period as to their role in society. Losing the Boy Scouts as an organization has added a significant gap in the opportunities for this development. Learning on the street and from video games or Hollywood films will not serve our young men or our society well.

I am including a poem from my book “In the Cat’s Eye” (Snap Screen Press 2009) called Boy Scout Camp as a short reminiscence of what will be missed. I finish with a thank you to BSA for all you did for me. May you rest in peace.

Glenn K. Currie

Boy Scout Camp

Rain pounded

The cabin roof.

Drum beats on snares

That Shrouded

Rabbits trapped.

It was scary at first,

Then soothing,

As we fell asleep

To natural rhythms.

It was us

Against the world.

Capture the flag,

Or clean latrines.

Learn nature’s secrets

Or bleed in its barbed wire.

We played games of life

In pastures

Where children grew.

We lay on battlefields

Of crushed grass,

Reading secret messages

Sent to us by a million stars.

And we found our way

Through dark forests,

To the sanctuary

Of  friendly campfires.

In the end

We learned about life.

Trappers

Taught us

To survive the snares.

And to see

The world

Outside

The rabbit hole.

Copyright 2009

Glenn K. Currie

Looking for Life Preservers

I have talked with so many people recently who just want to escape from the constant assault of 24-hour news.

The world is closing in on us. It is hard for a democracy to hold the middle when assaults are occurring from the edges and from within and without.

Even sports news is no longer a shelter from the storm. We argue about everything before the games even start. It seems like some of our citizens take great pleasure in stirring up controversy over even the simplest of things. And the complex issues like racism are defined by people that seem to have no sense of history. To say that racism is the worst in our history seems to ignore the existence of slavery, the Civil War, segregation, and a whole host of issues that have been overcome.

I meet almost daily with a group of citizens who cover the whole spectrum of political beliefs. We try not to get into politics too deeply, but find a whole range of other topics to discuss and agree upon that show a commonality that seems to be rapidly disappearing in the general population.

It is discouraging that so many try to make every subject a “no limits” fight that must be thought in a certain way. This kind of absolutism makes democracy very difficult. Our nation has almost always been about compromise on issues. No one gets their way all the time. Now people try to avoid even socializing with those who think differently on issues. We no longer have discussions on difficult subjects or work to understand each other’s views. It is a dangerous and disturbing trend that is particularly evident on college campuses. Our nation cannot survive a place where we cannot talk about issues and where we try to criminalize differing points of view.

I suggest that we all seek places we can go where anger and frustration are allowed to fade away. And when you have excised the bile, reach out across the lines in the sand and try to understand that, for the most part, we are just people trying to find our way in a very complex and confusing world.

Yes, there are a few arsonists on both sides of the political spectrum, who seek anarchy and wish to burn up all the oxygen in the room. We can only put out these fires by exercising a little common sense and common curtesy. Let’s try to avoid the Fire and the Flood.

Glenn K. Currie

The Fire

Polemics have become the norm,

Matches struck by doctors of anarchy

Light fires in angry crowds.

Mindless rage fuels protests of everything or nothing.

There seems no place to hide.

It seems pointless to speak against the hatred,

Cause no one is listening.

All the world is a cauldron

Left on the stove too long.

The Flood

A death of a nation is always surprising.

It gathers slowly, then happens in an instant.

A raging sea suddenly hits those thought safe.

Individual rights are swept away,

Democracy and freedom are cast overboard.

And emotions and panic become the rule of law.

Ships of fools do not do well,

When the typhoons come,

And the whirlpools carry us into the abyss.

Copyright 2018

Glenn K. Currie

Hello

I intend to begin posting on my blog in the next few days. Thank you for your patience

I have not written here in a while because I really don't know what to say. the world seems so full of violence, hatred and disunity that it leaves me feeling lost.

I can only hope that we find our way out of this darkness that has enveloped the world.

The good news in New England is that summer is almost here. To honor it's arrival and to focus on some positives, I am publishing one of my new poems.I hope you enjoy Summer Dresses.

Glenn K. Currie

Summer Dresses

                                                copyright 2017, Glenn K. Currie

                   

I love summer dresses,

The way they shape and define,

And yield to each capricious breeze.

Their colors brighten the day,

Bringing a sense of freedom,

That reflects in the steps

Of the wearers.

Their arrival is a sign

That there is still hope

In a cynical world.

That at any moment

Something wonderful can appear

That will lift people’s eyes

From their smart phones.

Sand in Our Eyes

All the complexities of life, we are told, are the result of the accidental conflation of events and materials in a universe both predictable and random.

Some think that this is all about to change, that we are becoming the masters of our universe. We are on the cusp of becoming gods. If the fools among us would just shut up and fall in line, we would be able to control this molten ball upon which we live, and our scientists could promise us eternal life.

Of course many others disagree. Some peacefully yield to belief in a higher order, others aggressively exercise their views by pursuing violent approaches to control their destiny. In the process we ensure that the universe remains full of surprises.

Poets, meanwhile, do their best to understand the world, and fulfill our roles as scientific artists. We try to put microscopes on life and human emotions. We use words put together like chemical compounds to cathect human thought and restore souls.

It has been a difficult time to do this. There is so much anger poisoning the environment, that it is hard to find the compounds that can bridge the abyss. And that is perhaps the message as we look at ourselves. We are tiny creatures in a universe of infinite dimension. We will never be gods, we are too imperfect to allow this to happen. And we will never have all the answers. All we can do is try not to let our egos overwhelm our perspective. Part of the great gift of life is the mystery. If we are honest with ourselves, most of us like the idea of having some things that are just unknown. We like being surprised. Okay, we don’t like bad surprises, but they are all wrapped up together, and part of the human condition. We fool ourselves to think otherwise.

One thing seems pretty certain. We will all be surprised in the end.  Let’s try to get from here to there without expecting everyone to want to travel the same road.

The following poem is a little reminder of man’s journey across this earth and how small a part of it we really are. Shamal is from my book “In the Cat’s Eye” (Snap Screen Press, 2009).

Glenn K. Currie

                                 Shamal

The storm rolled across the land,

Pushing a wall of sand a thousand feet high.

It carried the remains

Of crusaders and martyrs,

Filling the cracks in the earth

With ancient epoxy.

The lines of living were lost

In the enveloping darkness.

Borders disappeared,

As the wind blended sacred soil

With the sweat of shepherds and kings.

It was a world of the blind,

Each man a wanderer.

When the dust settled,

The moon spread pieces of silver

Upon the burial ground,

And the stars whispered assurances

That nothing had changed.

It’s all about winning. Suddenly, or maybe not so suddenly, our society has immersed itself in a game of self-destruction. If we can’t win, then we must at least destroy the opponent.

We seem incapable of coming together as a nation, or trying to heal the open wounds. If our population doesn’t wise up, we will gradually bleed to death.

All the talk about tolerance and diversity has been thrown out the window. Apparently, it only applies if it relates to our group. And, sadly, the most intolerant now seem to be the ones who used to preach it.

We have reached a point where Kennedy’s famous request that we ask “ what (we) can do for our country” has been distorted into, “if the country doesn’t agree with me, I will do my best to destroy it”.

It truly has become “all about me, and my opinions and wants”. There seems little room for compromise or cooperation.

A few years ago, I wrote a poem about a growing sense of egotism and greed concerning our celebrities and political leaders. I fear that this has spread into a national disease.

Perhaps it would be wise for everyone to take a breath and think about “National Anthem” (In the Cat’s Eye, Snap Screen Press, 2009). Is this really where we want to go as a nation?

Glenn K. Currie

                          National Anthem

It’s all about me!

It’s all about me!

Indubitably,

That’s how it should be.

Speaking candidly,

I’m in love with me.

Me! Me! Me!

It’s all about me!

It’s hypocrisy,

To didactically,

Preen endlessly,

About humanity.

Just turn on TV,

And you will see,

The reality.

It’s all about me!

So when up you stand,

With heart in your hand,

Prepared for the band’s

First song of the land,

Please sing after me,

“Oh say can you see,

The land of the free,

Is all about me”.

I think that one of the reasons that the country is so divided is that we are losing touch with how to talk with each other.

Face to face communications is disappearing, and as society focuses more on social media interaction, it becomes easier to think of the opposition as faceless evil. It is no longer reasonable people with differing opinions of how to make the world better.

The lack of face to face discussions turns our disputes into something similar to road rage. We hate that car, that tweeter, that abortionist, that tree hugger.

The world has changed so fast in the last hundred years, that different generations have almost nothing in common. When my mother was born in 1914, automobiles and airplanes were in their infancy. When I was born, the impact of the Great Depression was still very fresh, and we were in a world war that caused damage that we can hardly imagine. When my daughters were born, there was no real internet as we know it, no one had cell phones and a computer was a curiosity for the general public: something to play games like Pong.

Now, our children and grandchildren grow up in world where high technology has overtaken our culture. People no longer write letters or know their neighbors. Everything is organized, from children’s activities to how much soda we can be served. Many in our nation have retreated back into social media for our interactions.

All this change leaves many without the ability to hold actual conversations. They hide in their facebook accounts where they let their anger and frustrations build and explode.

Older generations often feel left out of the “discussions”. They sit at home with no jobs, no input into the new society and no hope for a future. Their savings accounts have been destroyed by the “zero interest” economy, they are ridiculed for being clueless about high tech, and their culture is assaulted on all sides.

The country sits astride all these generational disputes with leadership that seems clueless to the issues that many face. We were supposedly “surprised” that people who had been told to shut up suddenly registered their frustrations in one of the few ways still left to them. We made it difficult for them to talk about issues but they finally let loose at the polls. And now, suddenly the dam has burst, and everyone is yelling in the press, on the internet and in person. And they are all screaming at the same time. But we still aren’t really talking with each other.

We need a better understanding of history and civics in our society. We need a better understanding of each other. Part of that is a better recognition of the massive changes that our society has undergone. We have citizens from many generations who have been left behind in this new world. The damage has been economical, physical, emotional and structural.

I recently wrote a poem “The Skywriter” that deals with the economical and emotional impacts of being left behind. It is about America, and our own “hundred years war”.

Let us all hope we can find peace with each other in 2017.

Glenn K. Currie

The Skywriter

Copyright 2017 Glenn K. Currie

He climbed slowly into the weathered biplane,

Whispering to it in the late afternoon cold.

The engine coughed a tired greeting

Before it settled into a rhythmic beat

And carried him high into the azure sky.

The pilot had spent his life writing on the heavens,

His brush the noisy antique in which he rode.

For decades, he captured the eyes of curious millions

Excited to decipher his unfolding works

Before they disappeared forever into the ether.

He no longer painted the sky.

The audience had moved to other canvases.

Clouds were now captured in boxes,

Where words hid in their own vapor trails,

And no one needed blue sky or sunshine.

Instead he circled beneath unseen stars,

Searching, in the fading light, for a place

Where messages still floated in bottles,

Dreamers colored the world in chalk,

And words were still written on the wind.

It is not an easy world in which to be your own person: to avoid the brain-washing of the media, and the false choices provided by the “true believers” of the left and right.

Unfortunately, many in our society have ordained that everyone must think alike. We see this at our universities and among the clustered masses that gather to demand that you agree with them or remain silent when sensitive issues are brought before the public. Political correctness leaves no room for different points of view, or intelligent discussion regarding ethics or morals. This, in turn, results in bottled up emotions that only finally surface in “surprise” events like the recent election.

We have become a nation with too much time on its hands and not enough perspective to know how to use it. Instead, many in our population create imagined slights, or overreact to affronts and disputes, resulting in a steady stream of angry confrontations that split society and cause us to feel like a nation coming apart.

The saddest  part about all of this is that too many of our young people are totally unprepared to deal with the “group think” movements. Their lack of historical knowledge leads to little understanding that our nation was built on compromise and evolution, not the absolutes that too many now try to cram down our throats.

Too many have been processed through a shoddy educational system, and have been raised in an environment where they have been told they are smarter than they are. They have not been confronted with anyone questioning their brilliance and never learned to actually do their own due diligence on issues.

I wonder how many of the children born in this century will even know how much they don’t know. We don’t teach them history or civics or geography. For the most part, they are no longer exposed to philosophy, or the great books. Debate and active discussion of sensitive issues is discouraged in most institutions of “higher” learning.

The sad result is we are not preparing people to lead. Who are the future inspirational guides for our country? Certainly they aren’t the ethically-challenged celebrities or sports figures who think that achieving one skill makes them an expert on everything. Most of these folks are like the action figures that promote them. They are images, not reality. Most are less informed on real life in America than the average shopkeeper or garbage collector. And I have not seen many true statesmen/women evolving out of the meat grinder of our current political structure.

We are being carried away in a sea of platitudes and hyperbole, and no one is standing up and talking about it. We are dying as a nation because we no longer know what we are. We are a people that is being taught to believe in nothing. And if we don’t wake up soon, that is what we will become.

I wrote a poem a while ago that asked its readers to have the courage to use their common sense and strength of character to hold fast against panic and crowd frenzy when those with an agenda try to force us to rush to judgement.

I wonder how many still have that strength. We will learn much about ourselves in 2017. Many have already drawn the battle lines. There are many things that need to be fixed in our country. No one has all the answers. I pray that we are smart enough as a nation to demand that our leaders sit down together and work on solutions, rather than playing the petty games of stonewalling and obfuscation.

“Am I a Man” is from Daydreams (Snap Screen Press, 2004). I hope they are words you all will consider as we move into this new year.

Glenn K. Currie

                     Am I a Man/Woman

I am a man, I am a man,

A man I am, if only I can,

If only I can, take a stand,

If I can stand, and raise my hand.

When honor calls, calls me to stay,

While others called, are fading away,

I hope that day, I can display,

The strength within, to find my way.

When I see crowds, in panic fly,

And in that panic, the truth deny,

Trampling in hate, those who defy,

The panicked flight to invented lie.

Then I’ll find if I am a man,

If against that crowd I can then stand,

Can I stand and raise my hand? Stop

From saying, “I’m only a man”.