RIP Paul Hood, co-founder of Ailanthus, key influence on the founding of Agape. Feature in next issue.
Your essence
is blue jean,
frail denim.
your jacket,
an emblem,
you wear like a second skin,
the first left in a foxhole
in Okinawa.
Shining rebirth, you fled
those booze-beguiling fantasies
of the good life into
those denim arms.
thread-thin cuffs.
The fabric of your alchemy
is cloth,
patches sewn
over suburban slick
self-delusion.
Your silver eyes,
needle sharp,
stitched together the
fallen hem of fear.
You smoothed your
corduroy collar
against the throat
of things eternal.
You’ve become
your best metaphor:
a “remnant”
your soul’s threads
trembling towards
the light.
Excerpt from Ailanthus flier, 1979
“I’m 53, make my living as a carpenter/painter, a father and a grandfather, fought as a Marine rifleman in Okinawa in WWII, have become a Quaker; am committed to live cooperatively with others in ways that take away the occasion of war and turn the tide toward