Lunacy
In grade school, I used to love those assignments where the teacher gave us ten vocabulary words and said we had to use all of them in a story. Those were good times, and I’ve already tried to revive them here in prose and poetry. Today, the NaPoWriMo prompt at Read Write Poem invited us [...]
Books
Over the last year, these books stand out for pulling me away from writing and inspiring me to return to it with fresh ideas and renewed passion. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai Hummingbird’s Daughter by Luis Alberto Urrea The Devil’s Highway by Luis Alberto [...]
Being Here
I came across a haunting essay, “Am I Still Here?” by Anthony Doerr in the January/February issue of Orion. It begins like this: I HARBOR A DARK TWIN INSIDE. He’s a sun-starved, ropy bastard and he lives somewhere north of my heart. Every day he gets a little stronger. He’s a weed, he’s a creeper; he’s [...]
Balancing Work and Play
It’s snowing here in Portland, Oregon, and I’m wondering whether or not to start a blog. Django – my eighty-two pound, chocolate, standard poodle- doesn’t care. He’s been hinting at other activities all day with barks, yawns, groans, hopeful looks, nudges, playbows. I’ve been ignoring him to work on this fledgling website, respond to a literary journal interested in one of my essays, send another essay on its first submissions round, eat lunch, answer phone calls, wash dishes, read some blogs to see if I really want to become one of millions sharing the minutiae of everyday life….
