I’ve been thinking about ekphrastic poetry again lately, how much I enjoy poems that use paintings as touchstones. I’m a big fan of a wonderful illustrated book by Lynne Knight called Snow Effects after an exhibition called “Impressionists in Winter” that came through San Francisco some years ago. My father was a painter, and I’m sure that watching him gave me ideas about creativity. This is one of my poems based on paintings, from my…
A Walk After Reading Dante’s Paradiso We live in a heaven we take great pains to avoid. Shielding our cheeks from a winter sky’s chilled fur, we hunch against the brush of air that has rushed gloriously everywhere. We listen into our phones so as not to be pierced by arias in the pines. Clench worry’s hands to keep a woodpecker’s drumming from entering our bones. Stay separate. Refuse to sail a cloud into evening’s…
I don’t know if you have daily cycles related to your writing, but I find morning energy combined with the mental palette-cleansing from a good night’s sleep lends itself to creative ideas. I’ve even tried to write about the state I sometimes find myself in during this period, especially if I go walking in the morning. This one is from my chapbook, Another Circle of Delight, which has a number of walking poems: As Yearning…
Marian Haddad pointed me to a marvelous article, “Solvitur Ambulando,” by Carol Keeley on Ploughshares on this topic. I walk every day, often in the evening or at night, and sometimes twice a day, midday and evening. I walk when I feel anxious, tense, expansive, in need of a break, bored, even tired. I walk in the morning often to glean natural images, not necessarily to write about but just to wonder at. I think…
Anis Shivani has an interesting article in the Huffington Post that argues for the future of the book in print, and literature in general, as lying with the fearless small presses. It’s a series and he invites comment from readers as part of what he plans to address in future articles. What do you think? Which presses should or should not be mentioned as among the top 25? Is the print book dead with the…
My interview with the author of The Saint of Letting Small Fish Go and This Island of Dogs is up at Fringe, in the new summer issue. I had the chance to ask him about how he became interested in poetry, what it’s like writing as a Southerner and an Arab-American, and how MFA programs have improved poetry. It was a lot of fun to ask him a variety of questions, simple things like “What…
The Smoking Poet is full of interesting work, including a poem, “Tarnish,” by Jim Valvis that I very much like for its simplicity and subtlety. The issue includes a good interview with poet Derek Burleson and reviews of both poetry and prose books. They also have a unique feature “A Good Cause” in which they showcase a charitable project. This warms my fundraiser’s heart! I’ve had two of my poetry manuscripts edited, the first time…
I’m happy to have my poem “Genesis” in the new issue of Corium Magazine, The second issue of this exciting new zine just published today. Corium is the venture of Lauren Becker, Editor-in-Chief, Poetry Editor Heather Fowler, and Associate Editor Greg Gerke. It publishes poetry, fiction, and very short fiction, as well as art work. It’s named for the under-layer of the skin, as described in their mission statement: The corium is the dense inner…
Anis Shivani, in a review of the Best American Poetry series in The Huffington Post that some might say gives new meaning to the word “scathing,” takes on David Lehman’s sacred cow series, Best American Poetry, charging that: “Compile Lehman’s increasingly desperate forewords in defense of his precious anthology year to year, and you have the record of the poetry establishment’s grotesque self-justification. We do not need to be relevant or exciting or new or…
I was invited to appear on Merry Gangemi’s delightful weekly poetry radio show, “Woman-Stirred Radio” during National Poetry Month. A link to the interview is now up at WGDR, Goddard College, which hosts Merry’s show. Thanks, Merry! I had a great time talking to you and enjoy following your show. Visit https://racheldacus.net for more information and writing by Rachel Dacus.