Poetry and About Poetry

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury My rating: 5 of 5 stars A novel of an alternative future, a dystopia, and science fiction/speculative novel that could not happen here. Right? What if our electronic media encouraged our desire to be happy by not facing hard truths? What if more and more of us were pleased to be entertained and not challenged? What if our media became our reality and we ignored the natural landscape and starscape and stayed within four talking glimmering walls? And what if our politicians and leaders knew that, by encouraging all of this they, could keep power and do what they wanted with the full support of our ignorance? Would there come a time when reading deeply was banned? When thinking certain thoughts was outlawed? Where words were to be stripped of all but their most innocuous definitions? Surely this could not happen here? Right? View all my reviews

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury My rating: 5 of 5 stars A novel of an alternative future, a dystopia, and science fiction/speculative novel that could not happen here. Right? What if our electronic media encouraged our desire to be happy by not facing hard truths? What if more and more of us were pleased to be entertained and not challenged? What if our media became our reality and we ignored the natural landscape and starscape and stayed within four talking glimmering walls? And what if our politicians and leaders knew that, by encouraging all of this they, could keep power and do what they wanted with the full support of our ignorance? Would there come a time when reading deeply was banned? When thinking certain thoughts was outlawed? Where words were to be stripped of all but their most innocuous definitions? Surely this could not happen here? Right? View all my reviews

Why Orwell’s ‘1984’ matters so much now – from the Washington Post, Book World editor Ron Charles  http://wapo.st/2kk7wVY Orwell warned us that “already history has in a sense ceased to exist, ie. there is no such thing as a history of our own times which could be universally accepted, and the exact sciences are endangered.” And further, he saw that “the horrors of emotional nationalism and a tendency to disbelieve in the existence of objective truth” leads democracy to turn into authoritarianism.  For decades many in the academy have argued that truth is relative. Now this has infected our politically conservative as well as liberal discourse. Orwell’s hope was that those who cared about language and the right word would lead us back to a healthy polity by first fighting the “decay of language” that leads to doublespeak and “aletrnative facts.” Those of us who work the craft of language have this duty: to use words rightly and well and exactly in search for truths that may be...

Why Orwell’s ‘1984’ matters so much now – from the Washington Post, Book World editor Ron Charles  http://wapo.st/2kk7wVY Orwell warned us that “already history has in a sense ceased to exist, ie. there is no such thing as a history of our own times which could be universally accepted, and the exact sciences are endangered.” And further, he saw that “the horrors of emotional nationalism and a tendency to disbelieve in the existence of objective truth” leads democracy to turn into authoritarianism.  For decades many in the academy have argued that truth is relative. Now this has infected our politically conservative as well as liberal discourse. Orwell’s hope was that those who cared about language and the right word would lead us back to a healthy polity by first fighting the “decay of language” that leads to doublespeak and “aletrnative facts.” Those of us who work the craft of language have this duty: to use words rightly and well and exactly in search for truths that...

If a man is to shed the light of the sun upon other men, he must first of all have it within himself. -Romain Rolland

If a man is to shed the light of the sun upon other men, he must first of all have it within himself. -Romain Rolland

“There is always a well-known solution to every human problem. Neat, plausible, and wrong.” H. L. Mencken

Why Orwell’s ‘1984’ matters so much now – from the Washington Post, Book World editor Ron Charles http://wapo.st/2kk7wVY Orwell warned us that “already history has in a sense ceased to exist, ie. there is no such thing as a history of our own times which could be universally accepted, and the exact sciences are endangered.” And further, he saw that “the horrors of emotional nationalism and a tendency to disbelieve in the existence of objective truth” leads democracy to turn into authoritarianism.  For decades many in the academy have argued that truth is relative. Now this has infected our politically conservative as well as liberal discourse. Orwell’s hope was that those who cared about language and the right word would lead us back to a healthy polity by first fighting the “decay of language” that leads to doublespeak and “aletrnative facts.” Those of us who work the craft of language have this duty: to use words rightly...

Literature Today will publish my poem “Echoes in Green” in an upcoming issue.

Literature Today will publish my poem "Echoes in Green" in an upcoming issue.

Impossible Bottle: Poems by Claudia Emerson My rating: 5 of 5 stars What do you do when you discover you have a terminal cancer, much like family and friends who grew up where you did? If you are Claudia Emerson, between chemo treatments and doctor visits and trying to live your life for as long and as well as possible, you also write a beautiful (and as it turned out final) collection of poetry. Emerson’s “Impossible Bottle” is that glass container within which a sailboat was placed as she watched when a child. It is also the container of her life, her body, her mind, her soul. And it is the bottle that is this book and her other poems wherein she tries to place a miniature that is true to all she was and all she lived. Claudia Emerson had so much more to contribute and so many more poems to write before she dies. Her death came much too soon. She left behind these words and images, for which we are grateful. And their echoes haunt us now that Claudia Emerson has sli...

Impossible Bottle: Poems by Claudia Emerson My rating: 5 of 5 stars What do you do when you discover you have a terminal cancer, much like family and friends who grew up where you did? If you are Claudia Emerson, between chemo treatments and doctor visits and trying to live your life for as long and as well as possible, you also write a beautiful (and as it turned out final) collection of poetry. Emerson's "Impossible Bottle" is that glass container within which a sailboat was placed as she watched when a child. It is also the container of her life, her body, her mind, her soul. And it is the bottle that is this book and her other poems wherein she tries to place a miniature that is true to all she was and all she lived. Claudia Emerson had so much more to contribute and so many more poems to write before she dies. Her death came much too soon. She left behind these words and images, for which we are grateful. And their echoes haunt us now that Claudia Emerson has...

Impossible Bottle: Poems by Claudia Emerson My rating: 5 of 5 stars What do you do when you discover you have a terminal cancer, much like family and friends who grew up where you did? If you are Claudia Emerson, between chemo treatments and doctor visits and trying to live your life for as long and as well as possible, you also write a beautiful (and as it turned out final) collection of poetry. Emerson’s “Impossible Bottle” is that glass container within which a sailboat was placed as she watched when a child. It is also the container of her life, her body, her mind, her soul. And it is the bottle that is this book and her other poems wherein she tries to place a miniature that is true to all she was and all she lived. Claudia Emerson had so much more to contribute and so many more poems to write before she dies. Her death came much too soon. She left behind these words and images, for which we are grateful. And their echoes haunt us now that Claudia Emerson has sli...

The Indianola Review will publish my poem “Anticipating Blindness” in an upcoming issue.

The Indianola Review will publish my poem "Anticipating Blindness" in an upcoming issue. 

Other Than They Seem by Allan Peterson Perhaps Allan Peterson’s most accessible collection, these short poems brushstroke homely images into thoughtful eloquence. Musing on aging and the body, Peterson thinks “of making English out of birdsong” as natural images interplay with daily tasks and the poet tries out his meanings. Mortality lives beside the innocence of the Other as a deer eats his ivy and returns his stare with no guilt. Three horses struck by lightning lie dead, “their eyes open/focused behind us on a long thought.” Peterson’s “long thoughts” here merit daily rereading. Living with this book is like having a thoughtful, observant friend who always finds just the right thing to say as he looks out his window at our world. . View all my reviews

Other Than They Seem by Allan Peterson Perhaps Allan Peterson's most accessible collection, these short poems brushstroke homely images into thoughtful eloquence. Musing on aging and the body, Peterson thinks "of making English out of birdsong" as natural images interplay with daily tasks and the poet tries out his meanings. Mortality lives beside the innocence of the Other as a deer eats his ivy and returns his stare with no guilt. Three horses struck by lightning lie dead, "their eyes open/focused behind us on a long thought." Peterson's "long thoughts" here merit daily rereading. Living with this book is like having a thoughtful, observant friend who always finds just the right thing to say as he looks out his window at our world. . View all my reviews

The Voices Project will publish my poem”War of Headlines” in November 2017

The Voices Project will publish my poem"War of Headlines" in November 2017

My poem “She Asks Me Inside” is available in Dark Matter Issue #10

My poem "She Asks Me Inside" is available in Dark Matter Issue #10

Preorder my prize-winning chapbook Finite to Fail to be published this February.

Preorder my prize-winning chapbook Finite to Fail to be published this February. 

Check out my interview regrading my prize-winning chapbook at GFT Press.

Check out my interview regrading my prize-winning chapbook at GFT Press. 

The Wayfarer has accepted my poem “An Answer in Passage” for future publication.

The Wayfarer has accepted my poem "An Answer in Passage" for future publication. 

My deepest gratitude to the editors of the 32 journals who accepted my poetry in 2016 and to GFT Press for awarding my chapbook Finite to Fail its Grand Prize for publication early in 2017. “Finite to Fail: Poems after Dickinson” 2016 GFT Press Chapbook Contest Grand Prize Winner “A Last Bend in the Huron River” Red Earth Review July 2016 “Vessel” Red Earth Review July 2016 “Sugaring” Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine “Whittling Emptiness” Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine “Halloween” The Write Place at the Write Time “Harrowing Hallows’ Evening” The Write Place at the Write Time “Cutting Deeper” The Yellow Chair Review “Blackberry Reduction-3” Three Line Poetry “River and Father” Gravel “The Darkening Horizon” Folia “Becoming” GFT Press “Song of the Sixth Extinction” GFT Press “The Stone Bird in Exile” GFT Press “After Bashō” Heron Tree “Emily’s Ghost Machine” Route 7 Review “Become a Dark Current” Touch: The Journal of Healing “Becoming Stage Three” Touch: The Jo...

 My deepest gratitude to the editors of the 32 journals who accepted my poetry in 2016 and to GFT Press for awarding my chapbook Finite to Fail its Grand Prize for publication early in 2017.  “Finite to Fail: Poems after Dickinson” 2016 GFT Press Chapbook Contest Grand Prize Winner “A Last Bend in the Huron River” Red Earth Review July 2016 “Vessel” Red Earth Review July 2016 “Sugaring” Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine “Whittling Emptiness” Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine “Halloween” The Write Place at the Write Time “Harrowing Hallows’ Evening” The Write Place at the Write Time “Cutting Deeper” The Yellow Chair Review “Blackberry Reduction-3” Three Line Poetry “River and Father” Gravel "The Darkening Horizon" Folia “Becoming” GFT Press “Song of the Sixth Extinction” GFT Press “The Stone Bird in Exile” GFT Press “After Bashō” Heron Tree “Emily’s Ghost Machine” Route 7 Review “Become a Dark Current” Touch: The Journal of Heali...

My poem " Murmuration " is available in the Fall 2016 print & online edition of Aji Magazine. 

Light: A Journal of Photography & Poetry  will feature my poetry in its inaugural issue.