Wow! Go over the Bill Moyers Journal for links to poetry videos and transcripts of your favorite poets. Hey, Hal Manogue! Here’s a video of Coleman Barks reciting Rumi that will set you up for several days!
As a candidate for my masters degree in English literature at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville in the early 1970s, I co-edited the literary journal there, “Sou’Wester.” One of my poems that appeared there (juried of course by my co-editor) was “Under Mama’s Yew Tree.” Somehow it came to William Stafford’s attention across the country…
If you are going out Beware of mangoes And all such beautiful sweet things. —Victor Hernandez Cruz Mango on Tree (USDA) Click here to read an EXCELLENT interview with Victor Hernandeze Cruz on The Poetry Foundation site. Here are some excerpts of questions to whet your appetite: You don’t write what many would call autobiographical…
Earlier this year Nigerian poet Obi Nwakanma filled my Gathering Room with talk that made the world right for the hours he shared himself and conversation. We exchanged poetry books at the end of our time together. I sent some of Daniel’s hardworking roses home for Obi’s wife. In the days that followed our encounter,…
When I lived in Northern California, one of my great treats was to hear Gary Snyder perform his poetry with musicians in a cozy old-fashioned theatre…and another time….to hear him read and speak at the University of California at Davis. What remains of his presence for me is a sense of dignity…integrity…and a man of…
Late Self-Portrait by Rembrandt by Jane Hirschfield from After The dog, dead for years, keeps coming back in the dream. We look at each other there with the old joy. It was always her gift to bring me into the present— Which sleeps, changes, awakens, dresses, leaves. Happiness and unhappiness differ as a bucket hammered…
The Kindness of the Blind by Wislawa Szymborska (Nobel Prize in Literature 1996) Translated from the Polish by J. Kostkowska A poet is reading to the blind. He did not suspect it was so hard. His voice is breaking. His hands are shaking. He feels that here each sentence is put to the test of…
What are actors thinking in a scene and how do they prepare? More often than we know, the answer is poetry. That’s what we learn in Jason Shinder’s newest newest anthology and its accompanying CD: “The Poem I Turn to: Actors & Directors Present Poetry that Inspires Them” (Sourcebooks Media Fusion, 2008) with a preface…
Read Michiko Kakutani’s review of William Styron’s “HAVANAS IN CAMELOT:Personal Essays,” in today’s N. Y. Times by clicking here. [You may be asked to log in.] Kakutani’s review essay is titled, “Styron’s Essays Give Glimpses Into a Life Spent in Good Company” Here’s a quoted excerpt I particularly liked, because it articulates how I feel…
Digges was born in Jefferson, Missouri and went on to write poetry that would win awards and attract passionate readers such as Sharon Olds. Learn more about Deborah Digges by clicking here. “Darwin’s Finches is from Vesper Sparrows (1986), her first book. —JGR Vesper Sparrow photo by Chan Robbins Darwin’s Finches by Deborah Digges 1…