Introduction To This Website

I am retired; but I have been, in the past, an actor/director, a writer, a monk, an artist, an assistant pipe-organ builder, a mainframe computer operator, programmer & analyst, an astronomer (amateur but very active at observing and teaching), a publisher, and a poet . . . in addition to being a lover, a husband, a father, and uncle, a godfather,, a grandfather, and now a widower. 

Seldom matriculated, I have always been a student – that is always the best way to live, even while in school.

Of all that, at least the most important aspects of it are reflected in my personal coat of arms (see above right) designed by myself, which has, displayed clockwise on it the following devices: (1) a crazy-looking bird [poet], (2) a writer & artist with a quill pen for a walking stick [art], (3) a monk [spirituality], and (4) the Sun [astronomy]. 

The yellow (golden) star on the upper left is the logo I designed for Black Star Press, which is, in turn, an abstraction of my wife's and my wedding rings, which contain Black Star Sapphires.

What you will find here, on this website, is . . . me, which might sound rather egotistical or self-centered, which is fine because to some degree it is, as it must inherently be; “it” being MY perspective on this Universe in which I find myself. Every single bit of the reality of the entire universe is reflected in me; in that thing which, through 5 senses and a spirit, including a host of other spirits that I cannot see—including you. In this “website”, or “book”, I am attempting to let you see the “me” even as I would like to see “you”. If that is 'egotistical', then I guess that is what it is. For me, it is the only manner in which I can present myself. It is, I feel, the only “me” that is really worth knowing. I will be sad if you leave here feeling differently.

You will find this is the “harsh” history of my existence. Yet, you will also find, I hope, a spirit, which is God within me, in my case a creative, caring spirit that is seeking to discover & explore the reality within me, and which simultaneously reacts to and impacts the reality surrounding me—a state of affairs which is true for everyone who reads this as well!

I live in a world infested with wonder and mystery, seen, I hope, in my spirit and my art. I have known death, misery, and joy. I have grown old, and been tossed to the wayside by life. Still, on the one hand, I live in a world where I can, in my imagination, see with my eyes, as well as from a desk on Lunakeel, the sun in the East, the Earth in the West, with stars everywhere,  surrounded by the accumulated "knowledge" and spirit of many worlds, including Earth (and Nebraska). All of the worlds take many wrong turns in their journeys through existence, while encountering a plethora of dilemmas presented to them by existence.;On the other hand, those same worlds are brimming with potential, worlds of amazing stories, art,  and poetry, people and concepts, souls and ancestors 

So ...

This is all my heritage -- all that I have to bequeath to any of you; at least all that matters. I would urge you not to sneeze at such a bequest, as is the wont of youth. For all its failings, it nonetheless represents between 50 and 70 & more years of experience and reflection, which is certainly far more than most of you have now. You will have to discover some of it for yourselves, perhaps most of it, but encountering it early on might pave the way for your, hopefully better, experiences & reflections.

So, again, this is about me, warts and all, and, believe me, there are warts. I am human and have deeply human flaws. It goes with the inherently sinful nature we all inherently possess, just as an apple is unavoidably subject to falling from trees and rotting; a nature, which I (which we all) must constantly battle.

I think, however, that there is much more to me (to us) than warts alone. I hope my progeny – you – will think this as well. I might say more about my warts sometime, but at present I am either too embarrassed or too ashamed to discuss the worst of them.

I do this in the hope that you will all see how I became who I am, and what I have learned in the process. And there are lessons to be found there. I hope I can live long enough to record them for your benefit as you all age, as you inevitably will. Not all such lessons will be relevant to you, but I guarantee some will be – no one's life is without relevance to the rest of us, for better or worse, as John Dunne observed in his Meditations XVII:

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine] own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.

Most importantly, for all the suffering we each encounter in life, good will always come out of it, if you are prepared to receive it. Never forget that. It can take time, too often too much time it feels, but it is there at the end of the wait. 

I think the most important thing I have written -- and encountered -- (at least so far) is The Yellow Brick Road, which is about discovering that I am living The Dark Night of the Soul, St. John of the Cross' poem, with commentary, about how we all get lost and feel abandoned by God at some points in our lives; but He never really abandons us. We must simply find the faith to continue on, or as they said in the 1970s, keep on truckin'. In Valence I learned that life, and the aftermath of those "dark nights of the soul' constitute an actual Yellow Brick Road, paved with our own being ... with who we have been and who we become: 

Looking back, on this quiet night

that does not seethe,

but trembles,

I see many eyes in many mirrors,

in many places, I once called home,

eyes of many strangers

once called by my name.

They are yellowed cobblestones

of a path I have walked

through an ancient

and still aging past.

So, I implore you, even in the darkest of times, never give up; things will always change. God is always there, even if you cannot see or feel Him at times. It is always worth sticking it out in those dark times, which can vary from "just bad" to "excruciating". But things always change. Trust that they will and just keep stubbornly placing one foot in front of the other on that 'yellow brick road'. (That, by the way is what we call a metaphor.) And yet, this is, perhaps, the greatest lesson I have learned in my life, there in Valence in June of 1973, and I guarantee you, it is something you will benefit from, if you understand it and embrace it.

... in the words of Guillaume Apollinaire from La Chanson du Mal Amí, in 1913:

Moi qui sais des lais pour les reines
La complainte de mes années
Des hymnes d’esclave aux murènes
La romance du mal-aimé
Et des chansons pour les sirènes

. . . translated by Roger Shattuck, in 1964, as:

I who know sad lays for queens
The ballads of regretful years
The choruses of sea-doomed slaves
The romance of the poorly-loved
And songs which only sirens sing

As for myself, I have long been, as I am still, in good company – and I do not mean by that "me," but rather everything and everyone, good and joyous, bad and traumatic, that I have encountered in my life, and absorbed & spiritually metabolized into my world and my being.

... I could do worse than to have that for an epitaph.

—Mark Fairchild, July 2025, Lincoln, NE

This website will, as an ongoing effort, change, until the day I die. 

As a result, some pages might go "missing,"  giving you a "Code 404";  don't fret, most likely they have been reorganized under a different title or drop-down menu, resulting in a different URL, or have been made unavailable while they are revised or being rewritten.

If you recall any title, word, or phrase that appeared on such a "missing page", use the magnifying glass icon in the top right corner of each page to search for that.

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Access the various pages here via the navigation bar at the top of each page.

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Expect the unexpected . . . 

Snippets that I hope will someday form one or more  wholes: 

• Spirit

  • Statement Concerning My Spirituality

  • The Diamond

  • Of Rubble

  • Why I believe in Santa Claus

• Art

  • Oneiric Art

  • The Yellow Brick Road

  • Modern Poetic Evolution

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