It doesn’t take much more than a lawn, a laptop, and some wi-fi. At least that’s all it took for me this Memorial Day weekend to find myself on a luscious three-day (nearly) writing retreat of the kind I could have expected to pay hundreds of dollars for. Honestly, we like to call it “work” — as in “my work has gone to a new level” — as in “I had work in that issue”…
At a meeting of my poetry workshop this week the subject of memorizing poems arose. The leader of the workshop asked if any of us wanted to recite poems we’d memorized. It was surprising how few of us had any committed to memory, though we were all quick to cite favorite poems and poets. My editor has a surefire technique for memorizing poems that involves writing them out repeatedly, line by line, accumulating lines after…
I started a series of these awhile back, to keep myself from having hysterics on airplanes. They so don’t like that these days. This is one of the first (first published in BigCityLit.com): Salvation Salvavida bajo su asiento.It took me awhile to translate: lifesaver under your seat. Under this fragile body of lofting steel, our tennis rackets and rain coats, our bathing suits, and below that, turbulent pockets and updrafts.And under that, what no lifesavercan…
Thanks to Sherry Sheehan, I found this wonderful illustration in the comic strip Pearls Before Swine of the time-suck that is social networking and bloghopping. When I wind up at the end of a ten-hour day with two billable hours of work, I now know that this is what happened. Adding to your Internet-induced ADD, here are some stops online you should check out: Electric Literature — a quarterly anthology of the best contemporary short…
The gulf between care for our earth and thoughtless use of its vast resources couldn’t be more starkly portrayed than in the current British Petroleum mis-statement and consequent mis-handling of its catastrophic undersea oil spill. We have placed the future of what we CAN control of the planet’s future in the hands of people for whom its welfare is not the first priority. water pictures by FreeNaturePictures.com There are so many aspects of the planet’s…
I just got a free book from Concord Free Press, which touts its new publishing model as “generosity-based publishing.” You ask for a free book and agree to donate money (unspecified amount) to any charity or person of your choosing. They report having raised more than $134,000 for worthy causes so far. How they’re funded is a mystery, as is who’s behind the scenes, how books are selected, etc. Most intriguing. Naturally, as a poet…
I will soon make another animated poem appearance at Blue’s Cruzio Café. Red leather jacket is all I’m saying for now. At the moment, you can find my previous appearance (a tandem turn with the marvelous art of Patricia Wallace Jones) in the Stage Upstairs, rubbing elbows with Robert Bly, David Alpaugh, and Tony Barnstone. New poems up at Prick of the Spindle, a fine zine I’m happy to have work in. Especially happy they…
Thanks, Craig, for asking to see the poem in Atlanta Review. Here it is: Ghost Hours 1. Spring ForwardThe government’s at it again, tampering time. We stagger behind, wishing Salvador Dali minutes would lag instead of leap. April, the month of taxes and poetry, trails us like an urchin, asking for thankswhile we are thanked by the government with jet-lag and loss of easeful dark.Do you really expect us to pump the big-top minutes in…
My poem “Ghost Hours” appears in the new issue of The Atlanta Review. Thanks to Dan Veach for selecting the poem! It’s an interesting issue, with a section on poets from Iran, edited by Sholeh Wolpé, and five new translations of Rumi by Coleman Barks. I’m having a good week! Even though I did get two rejection slips today. Nice to have two pub credits to balance them out. Visit https://racheldacus.net for more information and…
The cool thing about this publication, aside from its being one of the most respected on the Web, is that they publish sound files along with the poems. I believe they were one of the first to do it. So I’m doubly happy that my poem, “Every Morning I Try” appears both in virtual print and sound in their Issue 47, which just went up. And thanks, Cynthia Bryant, for linking my poem in Poets…