When Poetry Gets Political

originally published in Wildroof Journal’s Substack For a long time, my writing focused on domestic relationships, often between a married couple or a mother and her child. Settings were key. So was “white space,” things unsaid but made clear by gestures and where the eye would fall during and after a difficult conversation. The natural […]

Second Editions – Part Two

Berried Branch against Sky This fall, Unsolicited Press is bringing out second editions of two of my earlier titles. The original publisher moved to a new distributor who felt these titles weren’t selling well enough to keep in print. My short story collection, Our Love Could Light the World, and the subject of the first […]

Second Editions – Part One

Strong Wind at Twilight In my essays on the writing life, I’ve touched more than once on how weird it can be to reread an earlier book. I find myself in a state of weirdness once again. I’ve had the pleasure of working with four publishers since 2011 when my first title, a collection of […]

Signing Off on the Galley

To proof a galley for the last time, just before the manuscript goes to print, is to say good-bye to the world I made and filled with people I love. That world is going on without me now, and I’m going on without it, into the next made-up world, and the one after that. If, […]

In Defense of Fearlessness

  Arizona Rain I think about fear a lot. Many of us do, I suspect, with a world-wide pandemic barely in the rearview mirror; a likely Republican candidate who tried to overthrow the government; and a planet that rages against us more each year. Fear can inform and protect; it can also limit and hold […]

POLITICS AND POETRY

        My poems sometimes take a political turn. My prose seldom does, and if so, it tends to be less blunt, more circumspect. Confined in real-world time and place, the plot of a story or novel will address what concerns me, particularly the plight of women, but always as part of the […]

Random Thoughts On Nearly Four Decades Of Writing

  River in New Mexico In a few days, I will be sixty-five. Got my Medicare card a few weeks ago. There aren’t many other tokens of this milestone, except being called a senior citizen. Which I’m not. Citizen, yes. Senior, no. In any case, I look ahead calmly and look back wisely. At twenty-seven, […]

A Novelist & Poet

I wrote novels, then poetry, late in my career. Up to then, my focus was on short stories. I produced one after another for about nine years until finally, one found a home. It took another seven or eight years before I was regularly publishing them, and my first collection, All The Road That Lead […]

Poetry & Image

cottonwood tree reflected in water, Lavinia Studios 2021 POETRY & IMAGE Poetry is a visual expression, even when it’s about politics, or feminism, or how nasty people can be. In poems, words evoke both what we feel and see. This is important to me, I’d say even crucial. Since leaving the urban mess of Seattle […]

I Wanted Brothers

I wanted brothers. Two, maybe three, but one alone would have kept me safe from my sister’s abuse, her never-ending rage at my being born. This necessary brother would be in the middle, between us age-wise, a willing defender. He’d always take my side. This brother would be taller than I but not smarter. I […]