Poet, Writer, Instructor
Handwriting grabs our attention in ways that printed words simply don’t. As I watched the recently released documentary Billy Joel: And So It Goes, images of Joel’s lyrics, penned on white sheets of paper, spread across the screen: long sentences filled with words and phrases, some crossed out, some traced over and over. Here was evidence of a creative mind at work; Joel’s words were like a sculptor’s fingerprints in clay.
A long time ago, when I first came across Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “Sestina,” I didn’t realize that the title referred to the poem’s form. I thought that “Sestina” was, perhaps, the grandmother’s first name—a different form, if you will, of the name “Tina” – “In the failing light, the old grandmother / sits in the kitchen with the child.”
There’s a problem in the literary world: we don’t have enough good, thoughtful criticism from literary citizens. Anyone who enjoys reading poetry, including poets themselves, can and should write reviews. Writing reviews has added a new skill to my writer’s toolbox, improved my close reading abilities, and brought me new friends in the poetry world. It’s become an important part of my practice.
In her essay, “Derichment,” from Synthesizing Gravity, Selected Prose, Kay Ryan denounces our culture’s mad rush to fill every second with “enriching” activities. “Children, it is often maintained, must be enriched; bread must be enriched. Weren’t they rich already?”
Just for fun, here are five poetry forms you might not be familiar with. I hope they spark some creativity.
A tribute to Gianna and Kobe Bryant outside the LA Convention Center. Last of a three-part series. Read Part 1 and Part 2. On Day 3 of the conference, I was starting to experience cognitive overload, a condition many attendees have commented on. Normally we writers spend most of our time alone, and when we socialize, it tends… Continue reading Tell the World You’re a Writer: AWP 2025, Part 3
It was 3:20 pm, the fifth panel of the day, I hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast, the room was warm, and my brain was processing the ideas from the previous four panels. I had a harder time paying attention, but I did absorb some of the information the panelists shared.
It took me a roundtrip of four days and 1700 miles of driving, but this year’s AWP, held at the LA Convention Center, was worth every minute. The rainbow of humanity flowing in and out of the conference rooms was, all by itself, an uplifting experience. Add decent weather (cloudy, moderate, with a bit of rain), an enormous Bookfair, and panels that more than satisfied my need for artistic stimulation, and I was in a three-day fog of happiness.
As a woman I am expected to automatically display more empathy than my male counterparts, to be more understanding, to give in when I didn’t necessarily want to, to say “yes” when I wanted to say “no.”
La llamada (The Call), Remedios Varo, 1961 I was reading Exit Opera, Kim Addonizio’s latest book of poems, when I came across the following lines from “20.5 Light Years from Earth:” “Sometimes writing feels so stupid I think I should get out into the world & do something like repairing fountain pens, milking snakes, something useful—… Continue reading Why I love being a poet