Troubling Love, by Elena Ferrante. Like many others, I read all four of the Napoli novels by Elena Ferrante. Like Troubling Love, they troubled and entranced me simultaneously. Ferrante’s depiction of a lifelong friendship between two women in the Napoli novels–if friendship is the right word– a friendship that covered five decades of life and … Continue reading Books of the Month: May 2018
Mrs. Martin was the only one who believed in me. When Mr. Jackson died I flew across the country to his funeral and told his family what he had meant to me. I still have the note that Miss Delaney gave me on the last day of third grade. I named my son after … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Pat Mora
Old men who hold their wives’ handbags for them as they put on their coats. Young fathers who hold their toddlers’ hands as they cross the street. The girl who jumps up to open the door for the woman using the walker. The cafe manager who keeps a water bowl outside, filled with cool water, … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Richard Jones
Last week my water filter leaked into the storage bin where my youngest’s childhood mementoes are kept. I brought it upstairs and spread her things out to dry. Onesies, footie pajamas, overalls with ripped-out knees. Her high school graduation cap. Notebooks filled with book reports and drawings and journal entries. Cards she’d written to me, … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Ellen Bass
Dear writers, If any of these three new June workshops look interesting to you, please join us. I’d love to see you there. All workshops are taught in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis. Friday, June 8: Manuscript Feedback: Picture Books Location: Uptown’s Community Gathering Space, 36th & Bryant Ave. S., Minneapolis Time: 12-4 pm Cost: … Continue reading New one-day creative writing workshops!
I. My new novel, What I Leave Behind, out on May 15, stars 16-year-old Will. Will is one of those charming people that everyone loves – maybe because he’s naturally cool, but probably because he’s fundamentally kind. He knows how to make lonely people feel less lonely, for example his socially-awkward boss Tom at Dollar … Continue reading “What I Leave Behind,” a novel
Last week I visited The Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. My grandfather and his family lived there when they first emigrated to New York, after fleeing the pogroms in Russia at the turn of the 20th century. Small dark rooms. No electricity. No running water. Four toilets in the back yard for the … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Robyn Sarah
Born a Crime, by Trevor Noah. I listened to Trevor Noah read his memoir aloud to me as my tiny little car and I cruised along the highways of Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma. What a wonderful book. Noah was born to a black South African woman and a white British father in South Africa … Continue reading Books of the Month, April 2018
On James Baldwin and Diverse Literature
Putting those recalcitrant toddler cancer cells to bed...
your own PDK for writing
a collection of beautiful words.....
Objects, Memory and Meaning
If it can't be said in a hundred words, then it can't be said in a thousand.
sewing a handmade wardrobe
"drink from the well of your self and begin again" ~charles bukowski
The Good Things Black People Do, Give and Receive All Over The World
Musings on poetry, language, perception, numbers, food, and anything else that slips through the cracks.
Thoughts on the world around me
the literary asylum
Bipolar is my superpower
