Ronald Pelias

Ronald J. Pelias spent most of his career writing books, e.g., If the Truth Be Told (Sense/Brill Publications), The Creative Qualitative Researcher (Routledge), and Lessons on Aging and Dying (Routledge) that call upon the literary as a research strategy. Now he just writes for the pleasures and frustrations of putting words to the page.

The Right Conditions

I’d just given up on the plumbagowith its black stem and falling leaves,with its failure to produce a single bloombefore I decided to give it another chance in a large pot. I cut it back and watched itconsider if it liked its new placement.After a dormant first year, it chose life,a glorious survival with spring’s beguilinggreen, with summer’s serene blue blossoms crowning the pot to say I’m back, I’m here,take notice of what I’ve kept hidden, whatI’ve always had, what you may now witness.The storm tore it, tipped its pot, stripped it bare, shredded its will to again flourish.

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