Djelloul Marbrook: What is Poetry For?
To say the unsayable is the province of poetry in society—to say it in such a way that it occupies the rafters, the eaves, the cantilevers, cornerstones, ogees and Palladians … Continue reading
Jenne’ R. Andrews: Return to Verona (in English and Italian)
…the real gave way to the more-than-real, each moment’s carmine abundance, furl of reddest petals lifted from the stalk and no hint of the black hussar’s hat at the center … Continue reading
Jose Padua: These So Long Days We Spend in the Middle of Things
I always loved the way my mother said the word ‘macapuno,’ which is a kind of coconut that’s sweeter and fleshier than the regular kind. One time after she’d had … Continue reading
Video: Brian Turner reads two poems
Iraq War veteran Brian Turner reads two poems at the 2006 Dodge Poetry Festival.
Jose Padua: On the Distant Prospect of Three Mile Island
The distant prospect of Three Mile Island from the window of our hotel room this December day reminds me of how underrepresented my people have been in the popular culture … Continue reading
Djelloul Marbrook: Annotating Books and Other Heresies
I grew up in an austere Protestant ethos in which the annotation of a book was desecration, as sinful as a Catholic mass. We were to cherish books and pass … Continue reading
Video: Kenneth Branagh reading “Anthem for Doomed Youth” by Wilfred Owen
Written in 1916 when Owen was a patient at Craiglockhart War Hospital in Edinburgh recovering from shell shock. The poem is a lament for young soldiers whose lives were lost in … Continue reading
Doug Anderson: Cyclops
Now a boy leads him by the hand down from the mountain to sit on the docks and listen to the sailors curse. Poor Polyphemus, they say, turning away from … Continue reading
Jenne Andrews: Nightfall on Ellis Island
In my dream someone said resolutely, Commit the body to the deep, and I thought, does the sea too promise itself? And the icons of liberty were themselves as salt, … Continue reading
Adrian Blevins: Explanation
When in doubt grow more hair is one of the sayings I am full of. As if a petty part of a person could be thicker than but almost exactly … Continue reading
Jose Padua: Beauty Like These Decades While Walking So Slowly in the Sunlight
Two decades ago I’m walking down 18th Street when two beautiful young women walk my way and as we pass by each other one of them looks at me then … Continue reading
Jose Padua: In the Season of Saints and Angels and Other Misfits
Thank you for the 80s, they were some of the most beautiful days I’ll never remember, thank you for the 90s, which I remember more of even though I was … Continue reading
Djelloul Marbrook: Three poems
Handling plutonium So this business of being you is about handling plutonium and is much more dangerous than your parents said. You stumbled across yourself so often you became your … Continue reading
Doug Anderson: The Way Back
. Dear American left (what left? who’s left?): could it be that while we were stamping our feet in righteousness the Right ran off with the store? Could it be … Continue reading
