As a guest of Witwatersrand University in South Africa, John and his wife were in that beautiful land for two weeks. While there, he wrote a series of poems under this title. "An Afterness" is the final poem from the manuscript.

An Afterness

I hear 
an almost silent drumming
of this human heart 
and know
it is my own.

And then 
between the quickening 
and the slowing 
of sleep 
between the rising
and lulling
of that exited inner touch
with all the thump 
and thrum
of something captured
in the dark 
I'm lost 
between 
the fearing of the known
and unknown ecstasies of life 
as at the end of every 
measuring
the stilling pulse
will seek and find and soothe so lovingly
the long lacunae of an afterness.

© 2000 John B. Lee

Henry's Creature

An Anthology of Poems and Stories about the Automobile

Don't Be So Persnickety

 [Book format by Marlene Lacey.]

Persnickety Sample

For this book, John has once again been short-listed for the Milton Acorn Memorial People’s Poetry Award.

James Nachtwey's photographic essay of intolerable human conditions, Inferno, has recently been released   Difficult topics including orphanages housing children in conditions far less tolerable than what they would face living alone on the street.  The book provides a window to review the negative contributions of man to the human condition.  Sometimes when one attempts to provide a solution, the myopic do not have the ability or desire to see if the "solution" exacerbates a societal problem.  Man needs to move beyond the right to say "Well at least we did something."  or "I'm presenting a problem for solution." to "I/we have improved the situation."  John B. Lee's Hired Hand does just that for John and his family did just that.  Read this book and see what it takes to truly make a difference in the world.  It means individuals, families making sacrifices and someone finding gifts in the sacrifice.  Read it to see what some people do without the need for kudos as well as meeting someone who has an art of seeing a glass half full. 

Marlene