Don Winslow Biography
As an 80-year-old research chemical engineer who was 23 years into his retirement, I never expected to start writing poetry. My college training and 37-year career were exclusively technical, with a minimum of courses in the humanities.
Prostate cancer for me and breast cancer for my wife Marion jolted my calm, relaxing lifestyle and led me in a very different direction.
While recovering from radiation and a subsequent operation I took a workshop at The Wellness Community in Del Marva from John Fox on Healing Through Poetry. This new outlet for my raging emotions led to a whole new world for me, a world of exciting and expressive words.
I live in Ocean Pines, Maryland.During the summer I work as a volunteer naturalist at the Assateague National Seashore. I teach visitors how to clam, crab, fish in the surf, and to better understand our coastal environment.
The subjects of my poetry have expanded from just cancer and pain to include my whole world. I now see metaphors and similes in everything I do. My daily walks have become meditative walks where I have worked out poems on clamming, body surfing, bait fish, and old age.
The ripple swells, a wave is building.
I wait, standing in the warm ocean.
I feel the energy nearing me— growing, bulging
...
With every Biopsy, a part of me dies,
A part of my body, a part of my spirit,
Like a rock beaten down by the constant drip-drip of water,
Slowly, surely, wearing, gnawing.
...
Last year’s garden was bleak,
A few annuals were all she could do,
Mammograms and Mastectomies, Radiation and Reconstruction,
They took up most of her time.
...
He sat at the head of the Thanksgiving Day table,
Head down, staring at-nothing.
Words of conversation slipping and sliding past him,
He heard not the sounds, he heeded not the words.
...
Shells, broken shells- everywhere,
On boardwalks, parking lots, crunching, crackling underfoot!
Poor Mercenaria Mercenaria, what happened to you?
...
Delivering Poems Around The World
Poems are the property of their respective owners. All information has been reproduced here for educational and informational purposes to benefit site visitors, and is provided at no charge...
3/13/2026 6:43:22 PM # 1.0.0
