Seen here with his 6’8″ frame squeezed into his seat on a flight to somewhere, Steve Shoemaker (1942-2016) wrote poetry. Often the verses came to him in the dark. At 3:00 or 4:00 A.M. Steve would turn to his right side so as not to disturb Nadja, and commit the verses to his iPhone. The poem was waiting in the in-box in the morning.
Often he led the reader through the lines to a surprising last line that shined a humorous light on all that had come before.
LENT
I will give up writing poems for Lent.
I will give up eating desserts for Lent.
I will give up sex for Lent.
I will give up thinking about sex for Lent.
I will give up lying for Lent.
I will give up bragging for Lent.
I will give up exaggerating for Lent.
I will give up self-centeredness for Lent.
________________________________
I will give up self-denial for Lent.
— Steve Shoemaker RIP, Ash Wednesday, March 5, 2013.
In this era of ill-humor and self-indulgence, Steve’s tongue-in-cheek verses ring the bell on the distortions of our best intentions and our shared need to focus on what lies beyond the self.
This photograph shows Steve sitting on an ancient bristlecone pine at 11,000+ feet in Colorado. — GCS, Feb. 25, 2020.
Views from the Edge 
Ah, made me smile, miss him! ❤
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