Author Archives: jaurquhart

Unknown's avatar

About jaurquhart

Jack Andrew Urquhart was born in the American South. Following undergraduate work at the University of Florida, Gainesville, he taught in Florida's public schools. He earned a Master of Arts degree in English, Creative Writing, from the University of Colorado at Boulder, where he was the winner of the Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Award for Fiction (1991). His work has appeared online at Clapboard House Literary Journal, Crazyhorse Literary Journal, and Standards: The International Journal of Multicultural Studies. He is the author of So They Say, a collection of self-contained, inter-connected stories and the short story, They Say You Can Stop Yourself Breathing. Formerly a writing instructor at the University of Colorado’s Writing Program, Mr. Urquhart was, until 2010, a senior analyst for the Judicial Branch of California. He resides in Washington State.

Social Media: Breaking up is hard to do

©2015 by Jack A. Urquhart 1000 words Last week I deactivated my Facebook™ account; today I did the same at Twitter™, LinkedIn™, and Google+™.  These were decisions motivated in part by a growing sense of personal dis-ease with social media; … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Coming to Grief, a prose poem by @jackaurquhart

©2015 by Jack A. Urquhart (for D.T.U.) They say living with grief is a marathon; like a non-stop jaunt, one keeps running, keeps jogging milestone to milestone. But I don’t agree— not anymore. That is what I’d tell you, if … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

An Existential Exercise: Making sense out of getting lost

Copyright 2014 by Jack A. Urquhart “Regardless of the staggering dimensions of the world about us … the fact remains that we are absolutely free today if we choose to will our existence in its finiteness, a finiteness which is … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Le Mont Saint-Michel: Juxtaposition of the Crass and the Sublime

Copyright 2014 by Jack A. Urquhart October 22, 2014, Normandie, France: I can’t say for certain why I’ve longed to visit Le Mont Saint-Michel since I first saw its photo in a high school text-book decades ago. Probably it has … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Road to Le Mont Saint-Michel

Copyright 2014 by Jack A. Urquhart October 21, 2014: In the front seat of our rented Peugeot 308, my spouse Raymond and our French friend Véronique, joust and parry verbally (good naturedly, of course!) like an old married couple. Their … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Train to Chartres

Copyright 2014 by Jack a Urquhart This morning we–my partner and I and our lovely French friend Véronique–are on the train to Chartres. It’s a place I first read about fifty (ahem) something years ago: Life Magazine. Mr. Joyner’s 8th … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Twenty-four thousand one hundred thirty-seven days, by @jackaurquhart

©2014 by Jack A. Urquhart     786 words Lately, I have been thinking about the passage of time and how quickly our individual allotments pile up—and how meaningfully. Or not. There is nothing new in this, of course. We … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Haiku for My Son, by @jackaurquhart

For Dillon Tyler Urquhart March 8, 1979—August 2, 2013 ©2014 by Jack A. Urquhart  

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

You Don’t Say, free verse by @jackaurquhart

©2014 by Jack Andrew Urquhart People say the damnedest things, people meaning, you, of course— say you can’t stand your mother, whose definition of trauma is a frizzled permanent wave. Say that your children’s lunacy makes of you a mental … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Surrendering to Cliché, free verse by @jackaurquhart

©2014 by Jack A. Urquhart One after another, they fall— chestnuts from the hospital bed, the utterances of old age: “ ‘Beats me, how time gets away,” she crepitates, this crisp of sun-dried human being, this wisp of ossified womanhood. … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments