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So much poetry month
Love poem, lust poem, breakup poem, prayer poem, curse poem, contemplating-mortality-while-looking-at-a-dead-animal poem, nature-sure-is-beautiful poem, nature-sure-is-weird poem, language-is-weird poem, art-inspires-me poem, what’s-the-point-of-poetry poem, I-miss-my-home poem, escape poem, world’s-going-to-hell poem in its environmental and political varieties, people-are-shitty poem, I-have-hope-anyway poem, my-body’s-failing-me poem, struggling-against-despair poem, hey-I’m-not-dead-yet poem, apology poem, not-sorry poem, I-fear-for-my-children poem, grief poem (a category much…
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Ectoplasmic micro poetry reviews
“Poet or poem or reader, the same/ ectoplasm,” Diane Seuss writes in her latest collection. I’m reading and writing poetry with ardor again, feeling that welcome ectoplasmic connection. I don’t know if my creative brain is clicking into gear because of the season (I often go dormant in winter and start writing again in the…
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Poetry & music & feeling better
This video is of a random person we watched on a quiet beach on our four-night trip to Aruba: a parasailer gliding back and forth for an hour, occasionally leaping or dipping into the Caribbean but mostly just writing his verse across the horizon, left to right and calmly back again as the sun set…
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Three of swords time
The best thing this week: my poem “Sex Talk” was featured by Poetry Daily. Lots of friends and a few strangers sent or posted lovely notes about it. This poem came not long after my mother’s death, if I’m remembering right, as I worked through the grief and freedom that follow the death of a…
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Divination by poem
I’m sending you a brief postcard from snowdrop time. Virginia has always had “midwinter spring, its own season,” to quote Four Quartets–a balmy few days in February–but never, that I can recall, so early in the month. Omens everywhere. Meanwhile, here’s what’s going down: Back to nudging my creative writers to try their hand (or…
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Forbidden blog
January 25th Last night I finished Forbidden Notebook by Cuban-Italian writer Alba de Céspedes. Yes, I steal time for pleasure reading even on school nights, when I can. This novel was a Christmas gift from a good friend, and knowing zero about the writer (or translator Ann Goldstein), I had no sense of the world…
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Some indie books for your list
This week in the U.S. academic calendar involves a lot of reflection on and (less rewardingly) grading of student writing. I always sift and contemplate of my own year’s work, too, looking over what I’ve read and written, considering what I want to do next, or do better. I wasn’t surprised to see poet-blogger Ann…
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The view from lockdown
Around 3:45 pm on November 1st, a “shelter in place” instruction pinged in through our campus phone and email alert system. I was in my office about to head to class, but I checked with another colleague, also on the third floor of my old building and conferencing with a student. They had both received…
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Blockage, re-routing, clearance
Did I ever tell you about the time I was on an AWP shuttle bus and a publicist’s assistant told me that my sacral chakra was blocked? We were chatting about reiki, so I’m clearly receptive to that kind of random conversational offering, but it’s pretty bold to diagnose a stranger. I instantly knew that…
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STILL mythologizing solitary genius
I’m both proud of and embarrassed about where I went to grad school. I tend to avoid the name in conversations with new acquaintances because it triggers so much judgment: oh, you’re smarter than I thought, or richer and more privileged or snootier or whatever. I never felt as if I belonged at that elite…
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LESLEY WHEELER 