Bill Pearse

Recent Posts

Confessions with Janus

By Bill Pearse on January 3, 2026 • ( 6 )

With the light what it was all I wanted to do was sleep. I went back to Stratford-upon-Avon, that sweet English town where I got sober ten years ago. I didn’t really get sober, it was more of a practice… Read More ›
Sun salutation

By Bill Pearse on January 2, 2026 • ( 5 )

I took down Christmas like a logger felling a tree, lopping off the higher limbs then chain sawing it down in sections. Christmas took days to put up with its exterior lights, interior arrangements, well-choreographed nativity scenes, collectible Santa figurines,… Read More ›
Pink champagne on ice

By Bill Pearse on January 1, 2026 • ( 8 )

How could we live differently? We asked ourselves the same question every year but didn’t get far with the answer. I went back up Tiger Mountain on New Year’s Eve, a few hours before sunset. I wanted to go with… Read More ›
Leftovers

By Bill Pearse on December 31, 2025 • ( 10 )

By this time of year we are feeling bloated physically and almost spiritually by all our excess. To watch the kids on Christmas morning tearing into their packages is like witnessing the human Id in its purest form. That desire… Read More ›
The ox and lamb kept time

By Bill Pearse on December 25, 2025 • ( 1 )

I got crumbs on myself but didn’t care. Everything slanted downwards. The crumbs got caught in the folds of my robe but dislodged and rolled like stones into the folds of the couch. All about it was gray and serene,… Read More ›
Maybe it will work out just fine

By Bill Pearse on December 24, 2025 • ( 17 )

With enough scrubbing and scouring powder I was able to get the nasty stains out of the bottom of the Dutch oven. It was a funny plum color. I’d had it for many years and hadn’t treated it well. Returning… Read More ›
Corpse pose

By Bill Pearse on December 21, 2025 • ( 6 )

Sometimes as a kid I imagined the darkness was a palpable thing. It had depth and dimensions, contours like a canyon. If I wasn’t careful the shape of the darkness would bloom and swallow me and I’d feel the sense… Read More ›
That last Saturday this fall

By Bill Pearse on December 20, 2025 • ( 6 )

There’s just an inch of pink in the sky in a sea of clouds. The clouds are a Rothko in shades of gray, swollen at the bottom. But the clouds move fast and offer more strands of pink below, a… Read More ›
Wintry mix

By Bill Pearse on December 19, 2025 • ( 15 )

I should know better than to use these cheap haircut salons even if it’s just for a neck trim or light cosmetic work. Today she misunderstood me and shaved half an inch above my ear in a clean line around… Read More ›