It is great to see John well on the road to recovery and writing. Two recent posts for your reading pleasure:

Charles Simic and Me: DP Poets

I got an email yesterday from a friend. He asked me what I thought about Charles Simic. He’s a poet that some of you might have heard of. He was the poet laureate of the US a couple of years ago. I think my friend was asking me about him because he figured that Charles Simic and I shared some history. We both came to the US after the war as Displaced Persons, refugees…

A really interesting reflection, and followed by a selection from Charles Simic and a new poem by Dr. Guzlowski, “A Dog Will.”

And for Father’s Day: Father’s Day

My father didn’t teach me to fish or play ball or paint a fence or drive a car. He couldn’t do any of those things. He was an orphan who worked on his aunt’s farm in Poland until the Nazis came and took him to a concentration camp. When he got to America after the war, he was too busy working to do much of anything else…

Also, compare and contrast to: My Father’s Gift to Me by Nicholas Kristof from the NY Times.

When I was 12, my father came and spoke to my seventh-grade class. I remember feeling proud, for my rural school was impressed by a visit from a university professor. But I also recall being embarrassed —” at my dad’s strong Slavic accent, at his refugee origins, at his —differentness.—