Yesterday I opened a can of tomatoes, squished them through my fingers to break them up, added them to the soup, and suddenly pictured the long line of people who made this possible. The invisible humans who planted the seeds, watched over the growing plants, harvested the tomatoes, hauled them to the processing plant, trucked … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Muriel Rukeyser
The other night I dreamed I saw a girl in a treehouse, reading. A girl in a hay fort, reading. A girl in her room, reading about worlds she didn’t live in, worlds that weren’t hers but maybe someday could be. All the girls were me. All were alone, none were lonely. None needed someone … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Sara Teasdale
When someone signs up for a workshop they often say something like Alison, I need you to be hard on me. Don’t sugarcoat anything. I just tilt my head and smile. When I was young I sat through lots of tense workshops in which a few lukewarm-nice things were said and then the “real” critique … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Jim Moore
I once had a hideous job traveling to various colleges for short stints teaching Speed Reading (useless), Study Skills (mostly useless), and Mnemonics (useless unless memorizing long random numbers is your thing). The job paid almost nothing so I camped in state parks and scooped up extra packages of crackers, butter, mayonnaise, and marmalade at … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Anne Carson
When I was a little kid I loved the book The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran, to the extent that I memorized my favorite lines: Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself. Then I grew up and had children, and then my children grew up, and … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Ada Limón
In the book I’m writing, a desperate child imagines himself far above the planet, far from the endlessly breaking bad news. He isn’t wired for the constant barrage of awfulness. None of us are. This is why I love and admire people like thirty-three-year-old Chris Smalls, who, independent from any giant outside organization, unionized the … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Robert Frost
Click here for details on my one-day spring workshops, including The Intuitive Leap on April 7 and Freedom of Form on April 8. The animal world I can understand: kill or be killed, kill or watch your children be killed. But so many of the things humans kill about are invisible and imaginary, like the boundaries between nations, … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Ursula K. Le Guin
For details on my one-day workshops, including Memoir in Moments on March 30 and The Art of Writing Picture Books on April 3, please click here. When he was eight, my son –known in the family for his rare, uncanny pronouncements–looked at me one day and said, “Mom, what if we’re all just people in a book, and someone somewhere … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Tadeusz Dabrowski
To sign up for one of my spring writing workshops, including our Tuesday evening five-week session that begins March 22, please click here. Moments: the tray of baked chicken and peas and applesauce that quiet night in the hospital. The first grade teacher who kept me in from recess but refused to tell me what I … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by Claribel Alegria
For details or to sign up for one of my spring workshops (which begin THIS WEEK!) click here. The other day I searched for someone who died decades ago, and found nothing. No obituary, no images, nothing. Then I looked for the book I made about him, and that, I found. He looked so young in … Continue reading Poem of the Week, by W.S. Merwin
Goodies from my mailbox and camera
Telling all sides of the parenting story
Waking Up to Your Dreams
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
Musings on poetry, language, perception, numbers, food, and anything else that slips through the cracks.
Thoughts on the world around me
Alison McGhee 