Last reading ’til September!

My last featured reading ’til Fall will be in Cambridge Monday. Check under “Readings…” for details (where there’s also info about a Tapestry… reading this Thursday featuring two of the finer women poets from the other side of the River.)
I unexpectedly read in Brighton last night…standing next to Boston’s first poet laureate, Sam Cornish, and [...]

Interview of the first Poet Laureate of Boston!!

http://www.cervenabarvapress.com/newsletter.htm

Black History Month Series (V)

Q: What are the dangers for a Black woman writer of writing first-person-narrator poetry?
A: The White-male-authored “I” of a poem is often seen as a universal spokesperson, a representative of the “human condition”; the White-female-authored “I” is viewed as the puppet of a man-bashing and very self-obsessed girl; the African-American male “I” is [...]

Black History Month Series (II)

Q: What does it mean, really, to be a multicultural writer?
A: I write as I live, through all of my valued private and public traditions and experiences…as an American. There’s no pie chart for my cultural percentages, and 9 times out of 10, the Black part is not open for discussion.
Blackness is a [...]

November Poems

My rare political poetry, part of a 7 in 7 challenge:
Must’ve Bumped My Head
Must’ve bumped my head. Could swear I heard
on the 11 O’Clock news that a Black person
just became president of the U. S. of A.
Fell asleep waiting to watch the old white guy
pull another fast one like that woman
as running mate ploy. Tricky [...]

“It’s Alive!”

Yay! My blog finally pops up as the first item when I’m googled.  Yay!  Hurrah!  Eureka!

Never thought I’d see the day…

I haven’t much to say here, trying to write a poem that’s not cooperating at all. I guess even the muse has been rendered speechless today.  Yes, everybody saw the polls, heard the preliminary numbers, watched Palin add buckets of water to the tanking campaign, but….  I never thought I’d see the day.
Congratulations, President Obama. [...]

October Poems

Based on Themed “Challenges”
[Horizontal/Vertical]
No Joy on the Horizon

I had no tale to tell of joy
that would be straight not “slant”–
of triumphing and climbing high,
my strong voice sweet in chant.
As misery is vertical–
it has no left or right–
horizontal latitude
does not seem worth the fight. 
[Arrogance]
Making No Sense
This is my voice, and I won’t give it up.
For [...]

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month,

which is the reason I am wearing a pink coat in this photo.  Well, actually it’s the reason I posted the photo of me wearing a pink coat.  These are horrible times, the whole world—American economy leading the way—has officially gone to hell in a handbasket.  Last New Year’s Day, however, my friend since 1991, Brian, [...]

Is this thing on?!

Well, I am slowly figuring out bits of techno stuff as I go deeper into the woods of blogging, no small feat for a creative writer who considers mastering the microwave one of her greatest life achievements.  But I google myself and find all sorts of curiosities: sites I quit attempting to register my blog on months ago that [...]