I was reading an essay about teaching creative non-fiction in Creative Non-Fiction Magazine a couple of months ago (I know, I know, we gaze so studiously at our own navels, writers), and came across a reference to Jo Ann Beard’s “The Fourth State of Matter.” The reference was matter of fact, sort of assuming that if…
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My friend Renee Olander has a gorgeous book that’s just come out, and she mailed me these beautiful cards with the cover on one side and a poem, “Scared of Devils” on the other side. When I was a kid, I was very conscious of my parents’ mortality. Perhaps more than normal. I’d check if…
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In two weeks Community Building Art Works is having our Kickoff Celebration. The board has been hard at work and it’s going to be such a good party. We have things to announce and tacos to eat. Tickets for the Kickoff Celebration are available here. We have a bunch of wonderful programs planned, but we can’t…
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I think I’ve finished the manuscript but I haven’t been able to release it yet. Today. Tomorrow. I often think, when I’m up to my eyeballs in terrible doubt about my poems or my work, that I should learn to do something undeniable and practical instead. Specifically I should learn to build coffins. Everyone needs…
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Oh boy, I’m writing a bunch of poems at once which is really disconcerting, and also really satisfying–well not satisfying, but kind of exciting. Like there are all these ideas that pop up as I’m walking around or drinking coffee or talking to someone about something unrelated (and just now I stopped typing this…
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Friday I’m reading at East City Bookshop with Faisal Mohyuddin and Simone Roberts. They are stunning humans and you should come. A few weeks ago I reread The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. I first read it some time ago, then lent my copy to someone. Then a month ago I had the…
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A very beautiful, very dear friend of mine asked me to read a poem at her wedding–a poem of my own. She is an enormously special person to me. We have been present for one another in times of excruciating grief and joy. She is someone who I believe, having known her since she was…
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We spent the weekend doing the things we like to do: playing cards, cooking big meals while dancing around, pranking one another, visiting the turtles, acting dumb at the grocery store, turning on one in changing alliances of two. It was our last weekend together at home before my older son leaves and it’s been…
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Tonight I’m doing two of my favorite things–eating a delicious dinner with fantastic people and leading a writing workshop with unsuspecting participants. It’s a stacked day, it will be my fourth writing workshop of the day. That is a sweetness I almost cannot believe. There are a few tickets left, please join us at the…
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My older son is off to college sooner than planned. He got an internship and is leaving early next month. It is a wonderful opportunity, I am so glad he got it. It is a terrible thing and I wish it weren’t happening. Both. I have been sighing with relief and weeping at the same…
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