~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ I was lucky enough to sit on the back porch of the Nantucket Hotel on Saturday evening, well out of the passing rain showers and white shirted winos on the street. Instead, I looked into the bottom of glass of bourbon and heard “Fire […]
Tag: Nantucket essay
Song of Youth
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road, Healthy, free, the world before me, Walt Whitman has joined the crew. He is not old. He does not have wild hair, a fifty year beard, and leather leggings. As far as I can tell, […]
The Future Is Now the Present
• by Robert P. Barsanti • His name popped up on my screen and a chime announced his fortieth birthday. He had been a student and, to my mind, he still was. He would always be the long haired Spiccoli in board shorts and Vans, napping in the back of […]
Books
• by Robert P. Barsanti • On this Sunday morning, the coffee is percolating, the coffee cake has been cut and tasted, and the newspaper is spread out over the table. Its various sections are weighed down by books. The house remains quiet. This is a house of bookcases. They […]
Hope & Cherry Tree
• by Robert P. Barsanti • The good news finally arrived this weekend. It came over with a wedding party on a rocking ferry in a thick, thirty-degree fog on Friday. We had prepared for more bad news this weekend; we lined up polar fleece, long pants, sweaters, and a […]
Club for Boys
• by Robert P. Barsanti • Spring landed triumphantly last weekend. The oaks and elms blazed kelly green against a deep blue sky. The wetlands and swamps glowed green and white as the year made the turn into spring and carried us forward into another summer. The Juice Bar has […]
My Mother Carried Napkins
• by Robert P. Barsanti • I have just been invited to a fiftieth anniversary party for the Jordans. The invitation arrived in a huge cream envelope with my name and address in script across the front. It also arrived with a bachelorette party of bills from the car company, […]
House
• by Robert P. Barsanti • Things are getting ready to happen out of sight. The world is sodden in April: the snow melts, the rain drips, the fog beads along the wires. Blind white roots push out and break the frozen ground. The daffodils have pushed through the dead […]
Storm Warning
• by Robert P. Barsanti • We felt the storm slip onto us from the East. The stars winked out the night before and the wind turned. By the gray light of the morning, the sky had grown hair and the wind had grown wet. Under the sound of words […]
A Sandbar in a Riptide
by Robert P. Barsanti The ocean is easy in Maine. Off of Southport Island, it slips all the way out at low tide, leaving mud and seagulls, then it slowly walks itself back in. At low tide, you smell the salt, the rot, and the weeds. Then, the water lifts […]