8 January 2018: I worked my way through various phases last year, different streets, different towns, sometimes different states entirely. I discovered new voices, new places, reading my way around here and there. Some books I sought out—some seemed to almost find me. I remember my mom asking me last Christmas, “How do you find … Continue reading Best of My 2017 Reading List →

1 January 2018: Dear Ada, Did you ever fall in love with Richard Hugo? I can tell you I did once. And aren't the initial run-ins always the best?—when a new-to-you poet picks you up off the ground and says hello, here is a poem. When a poet seems to say: Here’s what you’ve missed, … Continue reading A Letter to the Poet Ada Limón →

25 December 2017: I understand I live in an apartment, but I have always wanted a workshop away from the house. Not to handcraft floating shelves from 2x4s or beached logs, but a space from which to write out into the world. Something like Wendell Berry’s Kentucky woods or Stegner’s California. I want that silence … Continue reading A Writing Shack: A Christmas Wish in the Form of a Poem →

18 December 2017: I called him a loner, a mumbler, a legend in the making—the little, grey-headed man picking up beer and soda cans around my neighborhood, senior year of college. I first noticed him in September, early on in the semester. He pushed a grocery cart around, muttering things I never understood or ever … Continue reading The Can Man →

11 December 2017: From what I’ve read, the prairie was lost on Charles Dickens. When the old Englander was there (1841), he didn’t praise the tallgrass. He didn’t throw his hands up in adulation. He didn’t once stumble in his boots and mumble: My God. The prairie, to Charles Dickens, was not a scene to … Continue reading A Small Bone to Pick with Charles Dickens →

4 December 2017: Maybe he was right, the hope of roads goes on… —Richard Hugo, “Reconsidering the Madman” When I think of Richard Hugo, I think, of course, of roads, and Montana, and certain grey areas outside Seattle. I think of movement, the wandering mind and the imagination. For me, Richard Hugo is a particular … Continue reading My Friend, Richard Hugo →

27 November 2017: I have been working on a book for the past six years. (It is time—with a sigh—that I confess.) Slowly, in fits and starts, the poor thing has evolved into something I am calling: a memoir in bits and pieces. Snowballing since the winter I quit grad school, this memoir sits, fairly … Continue reading The Getting There →

20 November 2017: Admittedly, I am not on the cutting edge of the literary world. I can’t keep up. And—besides my daily glance at The Poetry Foundation’s website—I do not try. It seems there is no word for “time” in my reading world. There is no yesterday or tomorrow. There is no then or now … Continue reading Poetry Comes Up Where It Can →

13 November 2017: “Stuff your eyes with wonder,” Ray Bradbury says in Zen in the Art of Writing. “Live as if you’d drop dead in seconds. See the world.” Wise words. But how do I use that kind of sense practically? How do I heed the call? How do I see the world? Of course, … Continue reading Any Cricket on a Porch Rail →

11 November 2017: I try to keep things straight. The blue lines of my notebooks help. Sometimes I let a word have a whole line to itself—just to see what it will do. Only certain words, say, like ocean or evening. Sometimes I make a list of words down the left side of a page—grey, … Continue reading Why Kansas? →