Last night was different,
last night was strange.
You didn't know
our children's names.
You asked me again,
over and over to say,
"How many children do we have<
what are their names?"

Homemade Hawaiian fried rice with ham, pineapple, peppers, and onion drizzled with sweet and sour sauce, See recipe

Because the love of another
drove you away from me.
I hope you'll be happy,
happier than me.

"Good grief"
said he,
as he knocked
on the door.
"I had no
idea, you were,
on the 30th floor.

An emotional wreck,
I have become,
for I weep silently,
as I know what's to come.
A slow decline
and memory fades,
the eroding Dementia
is here, every day.

The veins stood out on
the side of his head.
The beat of his heart could
be seen pulsing away,
as the heart did its work.

A vein in your body,
a vein of gold.
Vane, as in Ego,
only the bold,
who think of themselves
before others, I'm told.

NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day:

Yes, but have you ever seen all of the planets at once? A rare roll-call of planets has been occurring in the morning sky for much of June. The featured fisheye all-sky image, taken a few mornings ago near the town of San Pedro de Atacama in Chile, caught not only the entire planet parade, but the Moon between Mars and Venus. In order, left to right along the ecliptic plane, members of this Solar System family portrait are Earth, Saturn, Neptune, Jupiter, Mars, Uranus, Venus, Mercury, and Earth. To emphasize their locations, Neptune and Uranus have been artificially enhanced. The volcano just below Mercury is Licancabur. In July, Mercury will move into the Sun's glare but reappear a few days later on the evening side. Then, in August, Saturn will drift past the direction opposite the Sun and so become visible at dusk instead of dawn. The next time that all eight planets will be simultaneously visible in a morning sky will be in 2122. Notable Submissions to APOD: Morning Planet Parade 2022 June

Photo by Alexis Trigo

(Excerpt from Ae Hee Lee's  "A Study through Homes")

Ae Hee Lee was born in South Korea, raised in Peru, and now resides in the U.S.  She is the author of poetry chapbooks: Bedtime, Riverbed , Dear bear and Connotary. Most recently, her full-length poetry collection Asterism has been awarded the 2022 Dorset Prize by John Murillo and will be published by Tupelo Press in 2024. See more

I stare at your pillow,
where your face, use to be,
It's empty! You're not there,
then I awake, I see you again.
I do not like this dream,
not one bit for it tells me
how close we may be to
the end of our dreams.

I have developed a liking
for Asian melodramas, Japanese,
Korean, Chinese and Taiwanese.
They provide an escape from my
worries of my wife's slow slide
from Dementia into Alzheimer's.
They are beneficial during the hours
I am unable to sleep.
A sucker for these stories that involve,
a women and man with involvement or
competition from others. I have also,
adapted to the subtitles in English with
the melodic narrative of the foreign language.
My story, my escape.

I write words
about words
and how they
interact or play
against one another.

As an example:
Alone in a crowd.
quiet but loud
was the noise
with the boys.
Insanity is just
a small step into
the inane. Did I
mean insane?
No inane, simply
stupid.
Long may he live
long may he wander
trying to find his
place in the Sun.
Did he ever start,
did he decide,
He couldn't be fast
on a slow ride.
Sorry just trying
to clean the cobwebs
from this brain as it
approaches senility.

Buy me a drink
the next time we meet
and I'll tell you a story,
which will be my treat.