My heart is so full; I don't know what to say ( Read more... )

My mom called a few days ago to tell me my cousin Sally had died. She had been struggling with cancer for a number of years now, and in the end, she was just too thin and too tired to struggle any more. She was 49 years old; the first of my generation to go ( Read more... )

I just finished watching Il Postino -- it's been years since I saw it. It's lovely, really lovely. What I like most is its steady uncompromising gaze into the contradiction of a famous celebrity being the poet of the people and the uneasy relationship of the people's poet to the people. It tracks the development of Pablo Neruda's relationship to ( Read more... )

I believe we would all be a lot happier healthier people if we just ( Read more... )

When I was two years old, my father (a university professor) was paging through the classifieds one Sunday morning, and came upon an ad: Island for sale. Five acres, one cabin with contents, fishing boat. Borden Lake, Garrison, Minnesota. He rang his friend Rollin. "Turn to page 23 of the classifieds -- do you see it? Island for saleMr Clarke ( Read more... )

So what is it about American poets? Why are they so bloody hung up on the supposedly unbridgeable divide between those who rhyme and those who don't ( Read more... )

When I was young, the end of every summer was marked by the Back to School sales, and the inevitable moment when feet left free to spread and sweat and wriggle and roll in dust had to be corralled and encased once more in squeaky leather. Maybe it was in part a response to a dread of toe slavery, insteps bound and chained by cord and buckle, but ( Read more... )