Naomi Shihab Nye: Every day as a wide field, every page
And there were so many more poems to read!
Countless friends to listen to.
We didn’t have to be in the same room—
the great modern magic.
Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer: Letter to the Others in the Dark
I am writing not to send you light,
but to let you know you are not alone
in the darkness. I am here, too,
scribbling with no sight, no certainty
Alexis Rhone Fancher: Hermanas
You’re the same, you two, J, my lover, said. Of course you feel an affinity. I stared at the Frida Kahlo self-portrait in his hands. Frida’s soulful sweetness stared back. You … Continue reading
Sean Sexton: Planting Aeschynomene Seed
It pours from a muslin sack like sunlight
through a cracked window shade, fifty pounds
to a metal washtub, old as your footsteps.
Antonia Alexandra Klimenko: Yes, I affirmed…
It was then that the light filtered through the curtain and passed through me as all things pass. Breathing out. Breathing in. Breathing out. Breathing in. Ah, Spring!
Minnita Daniel-Cox: The brief but shining life of Paul Laurence Dunbar, a poet who gave dignity to the Black experience
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Sean Sexton: Whelmed+
I tap out my pipe, aware of the grand majesty
of a morning taking shape—all the breezes of the
yester-day settle like complaint grown silent.
Chard deNiord: Songbirds Fly North at Night
I’m flying like a sparrow in my sleep
with only a pen to guide me
Ellery Akers: Four Prose Poems
Each of us is a struck bell that still reverberates. Walk down the street, and everyone who passes you is echoing inside.
David Kirby: The Questions That Matter Most by Jane Smiley (review)
The point [Smiley] misses is that the best writing often contains an element of the weird, the bizarre, the outlandish, the alienating. Call it wildness, if you will…
Ellena Savage: Selfish, grumpy and unkind? That’s my kind of woman
The characters I find thrilling are women who are absolutely not socialised or charitable or good.
Al Maginnes: Journalism 101
A friend stops me in the headache-dim flouresence of the hall that houses our little hive of offices to say she liked a record review I wrote for a website … Continue reading
Adrian Blevins: Nouns in their Habitats
New Pilgrims at Tinker Creek: I read Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek for the first time when I was about fourteen years old. I don’t remember now what I … Continue reading
Sheryl St. Germain: Essay in Search of a Poem
You’ve been trying to finish a poem for what seems like a long time. It’s a poem that has to do with the death of your son. At first you … Continue reading
