This seems like an apt photo for today, Election Day, where we don't exactly know where we will land. The photo is by Laura Rodley -- my gratitude to her for letting me share it here. Laura Rodley’s work has been nominated numerous times for the Pushcart Prize and Best of Net anthologies. In 2013 Laura was awarded the Pushcart Prize (for her poem “Resurrection,” which originally appeared in The New Verse News). She has two chapbooks from Finishing Line Press: Your … [Read more...]
April 20
I guess I could wish you happy April 20; I don't know though. It is an inauspicious date. I saw "Real Time with Bill Maher" the other day -- he's starting a movement to make 4/20 a federal holiday to celebrate pot, and I've got to admit his spoof "Twas the Night Before 4/20" was pretty clever (especially for a bunch of stoners--haha). You can see it here. But it was his explanation of the origins of 4/20 that I noticed because it differed from what I had heard. Bill … [Read more...]
Guest Post: “One More Thing” by Lesléa Newman
“One More Thing,” this wonderful poem by Lesléa Newman, seemed to me to segue very well from the last guest post, “Smoking” by Laura Rodley. On first reading this poem made me think of the past. Subsequent readings made me think of the present. I know it will make you think too. Thanks again to Lesléa Newman for letting me share her work here. ONE MORE THING My mother crept downstairs at night, (I made believe I was asleep) She didn’t … [Read more...]
Amy L. Dengler
In preparing for our event in Long Beach, I suggested each of the poets read another poem from Solace in So Many Words in addition to their own. Donna Hilbert told me she wanted to read "Portuguese Sweet Bread," for two reasons. First, she has a Portuguese daughter-in-law and has tasted the bread on many occasions, and secondly, it is a dynamite poem. The mention of Amy L. Dengler's name made me remember that my last emails to her had bounced back. So on the Thursday … [Read more...]