Leslie McGrath: An Anniversary
(Newtown, CT December 14, 2012) Cue the half-mast flags sagging eleven listless days before Christmas and the entreaties to return to our senses. It takes nearly a month, an advent … Continue reading
Michael Simms: Two Thefts
When I was in college, I committed larceny twice. Forty years later, I still feel pleased by the first theft and ashamed of the second. I was living with a … Continue reading
Philip Levine: Salts And Oils
In Havana in 1948 I ate fried dog believing it was Peking duck. Later, in Tampa I bunked with an insane sailor who kept a .38 Smith and Wesson in … Continue reading
Michael Simms: Going Deaf
Now is the time for drowsy tanagers. -– E.S. . First I lost the tick of snowflakes hitting glass. Then the sound of the cat’s tongue running over her fur. … Continue reading
Video: Marconi Union and Lyz Cooper perform “Weightless”
Listen to Marconi Union and Lyz Cooper perform “Weightless” — said to be the most relaxing piece of music ever composed. [8 minutes]
Video: “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe read by Christopher Lee
. . “The Raven,” written in 1845, stands today as Poe’s best-known work; he later claimed that he wrote it with “the intention of composing a poem that should suit … Continue reading
Ursula K. Le Guin: On Power, Oppression and Freedom
My country came together in one revolution and was nearly broken by another. The first revolution was a protest against galling, stupid, but relatively mild social and economic exploitation. It … Continue reading
Gary Snyder: For All
Ah to be alive on a mid-September morn fording a stream barefoot, pants rolled up, holding boots, pack on, sunshine, ice in the shallows, northern rockies. Rustle and shimmer of … Continue reading
Mary Oliver: The Artist’s Task
It is a silver morning like any other. I am at my desk. Then the phone rings, or someone raps at the door. I am deep in the machinery of … Continue reading
Jeff Oaks: Fathers
Ward Cleaver, Mike Brady, Archie Bunker, Mr. Cunningham: what other models? No one expected our fathers to do much beyond buy things, and I wonder whether fathers were relieved or … Continue reading
Yusef Komunyakaa: Ode to the Maggot
Little
Master of earth, no one gets to heaven
Without going through you first.
Philip Levine: Animals Are Passing From Our Lives
It’s wonderful how I jog on four honed-down ivory toes my massive buttocks slipping like oiled parts with each light step. I’m to market. I can smell the sour, grooved … Continue reading
The Movement for Black Lives: Resistence and Rebellion
In response to the sustained and increasingly visible violence against Black communities in the U.S. and globally, a collective of more than 50 organizations representing thousands of Black people from … Continue reading
Video: ‘Crows’ — a short film by Akira Kurosawa starring Martin Scorsese
. This ten-minute clip is taken from Dreams, a feature-length series of eight sketches by Akira Kurosawa released in 1990. Martin Scorsese, sporting a red beard and an unmistakable New York … Continue reading
