The Apostrophe Blog
Two of my poems, “On Not Looking Away: A Cento” and “At Harriet Tubman’s Grave in Fort Hill Cemetery in Auburn, New York,” have been accepted for publication in the Winter 2024 print edition of Fence. Per their website, “Fence is committed to publishing from the outside and the inside of established communities of writing, seeking always to interrogate, collaborate with, and bedevil all the systems that bring new writing to light.” You can read about their history here.
Instead of a traditional author bio, Fence uses a reading note, basically a list of books you have recently read or forever loved and thus would recommend to others. How fun is that? My note which accompanied my signed print publication agreement is below.
I read widely, constantly, and eclectically; I have never been a candidate for those clubs where you are assigned a monthly book to read then chatter about. I am lucky to live six blocks from an outpost of Portland, Oregon’s Multnomah Public Library where I can pick up titles I have on hold when my number finally comes up. That is how I was able to get my hands on a terrific new history by Manisha Sinha—The Rise and Fall of the Second American Republic: Reconstruction 1860-1920. Sinha not only expands our historical understanding of that much maligned era but offers original insights and perspectives that helped me to better contextualize our current political moment/nightmare. On a recent road/ferry trip to and from Whidbey Island, Washington, I ran out of reading material. Luckily, I found a copy of Marilynne Robinson’s 1980 jewel of a novel, Housekeeping, in a Little Free Library. It was just as good this fourth or fifth time around. Last week, I could not put down James, the newest novel from Percival Everett. A brilliant re-envisioning of Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn from the enslaved Jim’s point-of-view, it is horrific and hilarious, brutal and beautiful. Finally, I have forever been in awe of the short stories of the late Alice Munro. Last spring, I reread her entire oeuvre. What a delight. What a trove of wisdom. What a testimony to the complexity of this human life—our foibles and our triumphs. RIP, Ms. Munro, the GOAT.
The public domain photograph above was taken by Steve Hillebrandn of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Interests: Reading, writing, not arithmetic. The art and craft of poetry. Photography. Vegetable and flower gardening especially heirloom bulbs and dahlias. Movies in real theatres. Theatre on real stages. Art in real galleries. Crossword puzzles and, of course, Wordle. Singer-songwriters like Aimee Mann and Patti Griffin. All kinds of music especially 1930s jazz. Venice, Italy! The Dude abides.
- Honoring the Masters: Sugar Mule’s Via Walt Whitman: a 21st Century Gathering - June 22, 2024
- Acceptance News: Fence - June 10, 2024
- Writing in Form: Unrhymed Couplets - June 4, 2024
