Tag Archives: Eric Robert Nolan

Throwback Thursday: Wista-SHEER Sawce.

Flashback to the early 1990’s.   I worked the cafeteria at Mary Washington College in Fredericksburg, Virginia.  (It was a work-study program.)  Southern kids would line up at the counter for me to serve them Worcestershire sauce, because they laughed at the way I pronounced it.

It’s “wista-SHEER sawce.”  Years of seeing it passed around my New York Irish dinner table could not have misinformed me.  It was the Southerners and their adorable “WAR-is-to-Shire” pronunciation that deserved laughter.

I’m glad we had this talk.



Okay, who gets to be Jesus?

So here’s an idea for a viral challenge — “Last Suppering.” You get together with 12 friends and snap a picture of your own tableau — thus defending free speech by exercising it.

Hey, it’s no stupider then planking or dabbing.

Don’t ask me to start it, though. You know I don’t have 12 friends.



This post probably looks funny — there’s a hare on your screen.

Okay, that was bad.  Look — even the rabbit’s embarrassed.



Photo credit: Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

“The Mountain at Summer, Seen From a Passing Car,” by Eric Robert Nolan

Northern wind on southern steeps,
cords of copper rock in frieze,
arrowed “A” of singing geese,
swerve of bees and sea of trees,
summer green and salve of ease,
kiss of heat and coax of breeze.

(c) Eric Robert Nolan 2024



Ikenberry Orchards!

Daleville, Virginia.  Look at the SIZE of those peaches!

It’s a “Gathering” Gathering! (August 27th in Chantilly, VA)

Hey, gang, I just wanted to help spread the word about Poets Anonymous’ August 27th launch event for the second annual Gathering poetry anthology.  The event will take place at 7:30 at Courtyard Dulles Airport Chantilly, 3935 Centerview Drive, Chantilly VA 20151. (The door opens at 7.)

Admission is $5.  You can purchase the book at the event, if you wish; preorder information is right here.   The poets whose work will appear in the anthology have been invited to read their work (though I am sadly unable to attend due to a prior commitment.)

I hope you are all having a terrific summer.  🙂



My “prayer upon an empty hilltop” will be published in the second annual “Gathering” poetry anthology.

I’m so happy to learn that my “prayer upon an empty hilltop” poem will be published in the second annual Gathering poetry anthology — due to be released at the end of August by Poets Anonymous!  I will post details and ordering information as it becomes available.

I had my work selected last year for the Gathering’s inaugural issue, so I am especially honored to see one of my poems published in this second annual collection.

Thanks once again to Bards President James P. Wagner, as well as Lesley Tyson and Megan McDonald of Poets Anonymous!



Because they can’t just … Sho Kosugi. (Okay, that was terrible.)

Dude discussing ninja movies on a Gen X Facebook page: “I’m just wondering where all the ninjas went after 1993.”

Me: “Oh, they’re still there. YOU JUST CAN’T SEE THEM.”



Sign outside downtown Roanoke restaurant: “NEAT DRESS REQUIRED.”

I don’t own ANY dresses.

Seriously, though — I actually stood there for a second pondering what sort of sort of slovenly dresses women had worn in order to prompt management to make the rule. (Was it a wild Saturday night?) Because I am slow on the uptake.



Hey, in fairness, they aren’t actually “pandas” either.

True fact — I didn’t really know what red pandas were at one point and I kept referring to them as “those cinnamon raccoons,” and there are still people who laugh at me about it.



Photo credit: Mathias Appel, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons