May 19, 2018
15 Things I’ve Learned About Women in Romantic Comedies
1) Women fall down a lot. They are apparently extremely clumsy. But it’s cute. But only if they’re otherworldly beautiful. 2) Faced with so many astounding possibilities, more than anything […]
May 15, 2018
Finding the Magic Writing Ritual
Writers’ rituals are central to the way they work and are often treated as acts of spirituality or even seance. Haruki Murakami refers to his routine as “a form of […]
May 4, 2018
Stuff People Say When You Tell Them You Write Poetry
1) Is this a hoax? 2) And they pay you for that? 3) And you tell people this? 4) Does your husband know? 5) Is that still a thing? […]
April 30, 2018
Reconciling With Pain Through Ceremony in Terese Marie Mailhot’s Heart Berries
Parul Sehgal calls Heart Berries, Terese Marie Mailhot’s memoir of her childhood on the Seabird Island Indian Reservation and beyond,“a sledgehammer . . . a mixture of vulnerability and rage, sexual […]
April 20, 2018
“Memory as Missionary Position” and Other Works by Queer Indigenous Women Poets
Over at Lithub, Natalie Diaz curates a beautiful bi-monthly series of work by queer Indigenous women poets. She introduces this installment with the hope that it will function like Mojave […]
April 11, 2018
Marty Skoble on Why Poetry Matters
(Photo Credit: Noah Davis) For National Poetry Month, I spoke to Marty Skoble, the brilliant man who “teaches” poetry to the students (from lower school to high school) at Saint […]
April 7, 2018
Putting Together Your First Poetry Book
So you’ve decided you’re ready to take your onslaught of poems and form them into your very first poetry book. This is an exciting time, and I hope I can […]
April 5, 2018
An Interview With Leslie Jamison
Caroline Hagood: In The Recovering you braid literary criticism, memoir, and cultural criticism in an innovative manner. How do you see these different strands interacting with and enriching one another? […]
March 27, 2018
The Legacy of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha: Part Two
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Dictee paved the way for so many hybrid works that came after in subtle ways, but Mary-Kim Arnold’s Litany for the Long Moment (forthcoming April 2018) pays […]
March 23, 2018
The Legacy of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha: Part One
All writers who play with form that have come since are indebted to Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, often without even knowing it. I’m hoping to help out with the […]
March 20, 2018
The Writer’s Labyrinth
All things would be visibly connected if one could discover at a single glance and in its totality the tracings of an Ariadne’s thread leading thought into its own labyrinth. […]
February 28, 2018
Re-Reading Theodore Roethke
Animism, or the belief that nature has a soul, only provides a partial way in to Roethke’s poetry. He doesn’t merely believe in the existence of a soul in nature; […]