February 6, 2017
On “Chen [No Middle Name] Chen”: Identity in Form
When I first encountered Chen Chen’s poem “Chen [No Middle Name] Chen,” another example of a poet engaged with the anagram as a formal construct (I have considered, in varying […]
February 1, 2017
Echoes and Mirrors (Innovation in Conversation: Part III)
One of the joys of teaching, and of writing for the Kenyon Review blog, is the two-way street of ideas and information these forums afford. While I hope I’m educating in […]
January 15, 2017
An Open Letter from the Only Poet on the Professor Watchlist
Dear Charlie Kirk, Founder of Turning Point USA: It’s not every day that an American poet can address someone who thinks he is dangerous. For that alone I should thank […]
December 29, 2016
If in Poetry We Are What Would Replace Us
the way a searchlight listens over a lake it was the prayer-word out of your mouth your thousand-noun request it goes up up to the florescent weather […]
December 23, 2016
In Errata We Excavate Our Interiors
As you read this, a spacecraft pulsing out earthly recordings reaches interstellar space—beyond the Sun’s influence. It carries earthquake & surf. Tree frogs. Heart & Morse Code. —”Errata,” […]
December 22, 2016
The End of the Line: Terrance Hayes and Formal Innovation
If asked whose formal innovations have most influenced a current generation of younger poets, the first name out of my mouth would be Terrance Hayes. His “Golden Shovel” form is a […]
December 19, 2016
Unica Zürn: It lies in your hand
Enge, hier ist dein Land . . . es liegt in deiner Hand. (Narrow, here is your country . . . It lies in your hand.) –Unica Zürn (Berlin, 1954) […]
December 19, 2016
Call Her Esperanza: On Resistance & Writing
Everyone I know // Hates the racist police & wants a revolution. // But we seldom Aim the gun . . . Have you heard // how the bullets Sing […]
November 30, 2016
Strangers Meant (to be) Un-stranged
Your map is marred by borders that become a sieve of history, straining the wild from the willing. Missions and malls encroach your sun swathed villitas where flowers battle […]
November 23, 2016
The (un)rest is history
In the weeks leading up to the election and following the election, I fell silent here on The Kenyon Review blog, and in my life as well, to some extent. In the […]
November 18, 2016
When It’s Not Our World Anymore What Will We Hear: On Empathy
We wait for their approach. We are the silence that multiplies itself in the night. We are the dark with our eyes closed. We are the hard knots pressed against […]
October 28, 2016
Here the World Drowns
Then I remembered: Mama wasn’t gone but safe, in her bed, turning in sleep. It was I who went away—from Chopin in the bones, palms heavy with dates like dark purple […]