September 1993
Storms
A classmate remembered, a card playing grandmother, a Hurricane Andrew survivor
Sunbeams
Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships.
Wild Heart
Walking alone through a wild land, our perceptions soon alter. We begin to experience the earth anew, know the very place we stand as the source and locus of our own rediscovered wild heart.
Our Rag-Bone Hearts
Richard was introduced to mental institutions when insulin and shock treatments were in their experimental heyday. Inappropriate and excessive use of these treatments dealt him the blow ensuring that he would never again plead for his home or protest his lot.
Psychotherapy And The Status Quo
Early in therapy, a young woman I treated for depression described her ideal relationship with a man. “If I had my way,” she said, “I wouldn’t do a thing, except clean the house and talk on the phone. He would make all the decisions. He would pick where we go, what we do, who we see.”
The GirlsClub
I’m depressed. My girlfriend left me. Then I got cancer of the colon, so I had to have my large intestine removed, cut out, the whole thing, gone.
Jane’s Letter
Jane lingers in bed beneath the veil of the mosquito net and listens to schoolchildren slosh their clothing in buckets of water near her window.
The Great Army
When I was a child I used to beg the Old Buddhist to tell this story over and over again, especially the descriptions of the soldiers.