I have lived here all my life, raised five wonderful Children and ridden my Harley through Rocky Mountain forests. In my youth I wrote songs and howled the lyrics in whiskey bars with my brothers. We rode truck inner tubes on the South Platte River by Conifer and Deckers, down through "The Chutes". Those same tubes served us in the winter as we flew down ice trails at the foot of the Rockies by Evergreen Lake. Three years ago I married Karen, a great lady from Boulder I met on the internet. She and I live in Lafayette, ten miles east of Boulder with my youngest son and her two boys. She takes me down walkin' at the Coal Creek Trail, a beautiful slice of nature I call "The Thin Woods". If I didn't write I would choke on the muse. I have had a lifelong passion for words and have chased them around for over three decades. I am also available to work on a tight schedule and work well under pressure. A year and a half ago, as I began to wind up my novel, I started taking steps to develop a footprint on the internet. The novel, "Madman Chronicles: The Warrior", was released January 2004 by Publish America. In the process of promoting The Warrior I have made strides in the business of internet and multimedia marketing. I probably haven't developed 'a flair' for it yet but am moving in that direction. I am honest, loyal and tenacious. I am a writin' dog. You point me at it, I'll write it. Following this message is a bibliography of work published the past couple of years and excerpts from some of the same. I appreciate your consideration.

Children thought I was a snowman but no, I was just a man in the snow. "Let's build one then!"

They are wonderful and complex in their simplicity... Children. One wonders at their rosy cheeks and warm noses, indifferent to discomfort at the prospect of creating Snow People.

"Wait first," I tell them, "We must seek a blessing of Snow Angels." I have plenty of time these days for slow memories as I kneel down in the deep fluff and flop over on my back. There are a host of oohs and aahs as I flap my arms and legs to create gown and wings. Small hands help me up and soon, indifferent to discomfort, I witness a fluttering of real angels, playing in the stuff of Gods.

Jacket Blurb for 'The Warrior'

The year is 2010 and the planet is in a state of chaos at the end of a catastrophic world war. Wulf must leave his family to descend into the Earth where he hopes to find a place of refuge for his People. He is accompanied by his comrade-in-arms, the Cajun, Angelo. Once in the 'Labyrinth', they are accosted by bloodthirsty mutant creatures and a raging assassin. Wulf faces many perils, not the least of which is the truth about himself. The Patron knows, watching from his lair, 'The Night Room'. Naked ladies dance on his fiery stages as he watches and manipulates Wulf. Lylia finds him there, cold as ice and forced to dance. Still she stands proud and proves to be more than the wicked Patron can handle. He laughs as she makes her danse, gives her the tattooed skin of her rapist, sends his head to Wulf.

Bite XIII from Quodlibet

A Child playing
A Man listening
Ladies clinking coffee cups
The long leather of his weathered face
Their graceful laughter, almost genteel
Still the Child's fingers play
Sorrow and gladness ride the man's features
A lone tear slides down his cheek
Stops to rest on the lips of his smile
What symphony of life this
Such joy of morning living
Instance of rapture simplified
Complicity of random blessed event

Verse LI from Reptiles & Dust

I am almost Africa
rife with insidious disease
colonized and raped of century
set upon by lions
and my lions are all died
carried away on stiff trunk ivory
torn from the jaws of my giants

Verse IX from Reptiles & Dust

In some pastures alfalfa
sweet scent of first love
and the death of reason
weight of passion flower scent
rolling in the haymow
Old men of car trips
roll down the window and dream

Excerpt from Christopher Early

One morning Christopher's legs hurt so bad he had to use the walker-thing to make it from the bedroom to the kitchen. He climbed painfully onto the chair and almost fell getting his Froot Loops from the high shelf. He made it though. The pain tried to make him cry but he wouldn't let it. The house was already full of tears. He started the coffee and made his necklaces. This time, only this time, he forced his stiff aching fingers to make two extra big ones. He put them in a circle around Mommy and Daddy's coffee cups.

He put the thirteen tiny necklaces on his fingers, wearing them like happy delicious rings. He gripped the walker-thing, careful not to damage the gifts he had made for his friends. He was kneeling on his bed, arms resting on the window sill, small hands palm up and reaching out the window. He was too tired to take the rings off but it didn't matter. This time, only this time, his friends flew to him, their wings fluttering kisses against his face, their tiny mouths careful not to injure him as they walked his palms, then flew away with the gifts he had made. And this time, only this time, Christopher flew away with them.

Message From/To A Friend

Sometimes...
we take our yesterdays for granted,
the good deeds of everyday people
accepted and expected as the status quo,
minimizing the importance
of the friendly phone call,
the warm hug
received at 'just the right moment',
'just when I needed it most'.

When I'm feeling down,
your face appears, unbidden,
in the theater of my mind.
Just the thought of you
makes me feel better,
more significant.
A smile comes to my lips
as I realize how precious friendship is,
the value of the emotional hug
I have just received,
the need fulfilled,
to know I am appreciated
by a fellow human being.

Our friendship defies definition,
what mere words might convey.
It is no coincidence.
It defines us,
has a life of its own.
From behind the crumbling curtains
of my daily existence,
it peeked out and told me to tell you,
to thank you
for the phone calls, the hugs,
your spontaneous guest appearances
on the stage of my emotions.

Coffle

Midnight, Alexandria Virginia, May 23, 1861

A line of chained men, eighteen in all, struggle to find a rhythm in their leg irons which are chained to their waist to their manacled hands.  Each wears a steel collar.  A chain connects these so the men are forced to march in a line.  They make a coffle.  A fat unkempt white man and his young assistant lead the way, their whips dragging in the dust.  The coffle is black and will offer no resistance enroute to the Slave Pens.  They are the midnight parade, one the giddy white folks won't be bothered to witness. 

The overseer hands his assistant a coin and the key to the pen.  "Jus lock 'em in a cell.  We'll separate 'em and spray 'em down tomorrow 'fore the buyers come.  Write this down and take it to Mister Birch:  'I got me a dozen an' a half stone breakers.  They is long limbed and hard muscled.  You wanna beat the sale, come see 'fore ten tomorra mornin'. 

The youngster pulled a pad from his pocket and wrote furiously.  He stuffed the pad back in his pocket, fumbled the key into the lock.  The door to the cells opened with a complaining screech.  The old man laughed and scratched his groin.  "Ya all boys get on in there.  That bolt cannot be lifted from the inside."

The black men, eyes on the ground before them, shuffled into the dark stinking quarters of the Slave Pen.  Here they would sleep and try to hold their water until morning came.  Before the door closed behind them, one began to sing.  His voice was low and syrupy and cracked like muddy water.  He sang:

  Mister, set your whip down
  You done cut this body 'way
  If I never lift that hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

The younger white man banged the door with his whip.  "You want I go whup 'em quiet?"

The fat man laughed.  "I like your brass, boy.  You go give Birch that note.  Come on back an' if they's still singin', I want you write down them words.  I heard tell they's some kinda unnerground railroad an' them songs is signals to ol' Abe Lincoln hisself.  You bring me them darky's words an' I'll tip a pint or two with ya.  You go on now!"  He gave the padlock a pull to reassure himself and turned to go to his quarters.  A voice darker than prison followed him down.

  Mister Overseer
  You done sold my Children 'way
  I am chained here to this hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

  Lord as my witness
  Turn this body back to clay
  I will bury that old hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

  Mama, tell your Children
  It don't do no good to pray
  With your hands born to that hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

"Man, it's so dark in here, I can't even see your eyes.  Why you keep singin' that ol' song anyway?  Ain't nobody listenin', ain't nobody give a care 'bout us."

The syrupy voice stopped.  Chains rattled a bit and the singing man spoke.  "You hear that fat man?  Well, I got a bolt in me...  that's what I got and it cannot be lifted from the outside.  It gets rusty, just like that one on the door.  If I want to oil it all I have to do is sing.  If you listened, you would know.  There's a tall man in a dark hat.  He's comin' to break these chains and, when he does, I'm gonna fight in that man's army.  That's my dream.  I may never find my people but I can offer myself up.  Wherever they are, they gon' be free."

"You crazy, man.  How's that song go?  Mind if I sing with ya?  Maybe I could go fight in that army with you...  They really let a black man shoot and fight..."

But the singer was singing:

  Take a word to Mister Lincoln
  If he breaks these chains away
  I will fight them with this hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

Next day the Union army surprised Confederates and captured the Slave Pen but it was empty except for one old man chained to the middle of the floor by the leg and he was singing:

  Four score and seven
  If a man is what he say
  He gon' free me from this hammer
  Oh-oh live long day

  Mister, I'm the digger
  and that hole I made today
  is the last one; you can lay me
  Oh-oh live long day

BIBLIOGRAPHY

July 2006             Slated as featured poet in NEWSLETTER INAGO July 2006 (print only) Work represented: Birds I View, I Would, Zooidal Veldt, Trees, Watercolor Mirror, Earth Chapel, Behind the Phases, Wither Go Watching, Sketch

February 2004      Published in Flesh From Ashes (print & CD with music)  Work represented:  Anachronistic Knot, Art of Soon Rebel, Children of Baghdad/Boulder Radio, The Door, The Warrior Angelo, Tin Tinkle Weep and Young America (in magazine)  The Warrior Angelo, The Door and Legend of New Horse (music on CD)

Link:  http://www.fleshfromashes.net

Winter 2004         Published in Blackwidow Web of Poetry (print only) Work represented: 10 Haiku, 3 epigrams, 6 pieces of artwork

January 2004       Published in Apollo's Lyre (ezine) Work represented: Proposition of Position, Snow Angels, Worm, Across the Years

Link: http://www.apolloslyre.com/PoetryTomSternerHowe.htm