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Haunted Matisse & packing light
On the Friday after Thanksgiving, we visited the “Matisse in the 1930s” exhibit in the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts, and there was plenty NOT to like. So many odalisques! The images that stayed with me in a more positive way did so because the way they reflected process struck me as appealingly uncanny. The […]
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Word-feast
If you have some quiet hours this week, I hope you’ll read the amazing poems in the new issue of Shenandoah. Hot-flashing in your Thanksgiving kitchen? Ann Hudson has you covered. Missing green horizons? Look at Oliver de la Paz’s Diaspora Sonnets. Craving something funny-dark? See Kelli Russell Agodon and Julie Marie Wade. Want a […]
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Book birthday and other shenanigans
Happy 6-month birthday, little book. Thanks to all the friends who sent and posted these baby and launch portraits, and to the reviewers, personal-note-writers, and quiet book-buyers. I feel guilty that chairing my department has slowed down my promotion efforts, so as always, if you have suggestions for events or other ways of getting the […]
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Five year writing plan for the witches’ new year
As Department Head, I’ve been reading colleagues’ Five Year Plans, which oddly enough are due around Halloween or Samhain (or however you think about this spooky midpoint between the fall equinox and winter solstice). I have an official Five Year Plan myself–I’m halfway through that cycle–but maybe it’s time for a weirder one. I’m a […]
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Book season (hours of ellipsis)
Pumpkins are all right (in pies, not in lattes, thanks)–but what the suddenly cool, rainy weather makes me want to do is read. It’s also nourishing to be read. Hurrah for the thoughtful attention Sarah Stockton gives Poetry’s Possible Worlds in the Staff Favorites section of River Mouth Review. I love the Octoberish timing AND […]
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The wheel(er) considers turning
“Yeah, I didn’t want to remind you about the equinox,” my spouse said. “Right? Another thing on the to-do list,” I agreed. We mimed leaning our shoulders into the wheel of the year. “But I got it done!” It’s autumn and my birthday and I’m struggling. Sleep has been especially hard. If I’m to have […]
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Professor monster will see you now
First, Poetry’s Possible Worlds is back in print, with copies trickling into warehouses and order-able again! Phew. And I’m looking forward to my book-club-style discussion of Unbecoming in Radford VA next week, details in the flier above. What’s haunting a larger passage of my brain-cave, though: facing down the monstrous mixedness of my September life. […]
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Splitting / creative scholarship
My son left this week for his senior year at college, which removed a handy barrier between me and working all the time. My writer self, my teaching self, and my role as Department Head are competing hardest for my hours. Teaching and chairing are more deadline-driven so my writer self is hanging on by […]
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To do, poetically–or just some human sleep
I know people love fall, a feeling I get a glimpse of during sabbaticals, but for me it’s the season of deadlines, flurry, trying to carry too many turning leaves at once then dropping them. For instance, today is the three-month anniversary of my new book, Poetry’s Possible Worlds, yay! I meant to get a […]
LESLEY WHEELER 