Necessary Poetry August 31, 2007: There are certain songs I cannot listen to anymore because they remind me of someone associated with the pain of loss. R.E.M.’s “Losing My Religion” reminds me of an old heartbreak in college, Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” of a more recent heartbreak, and listening to Luther Vandross’ “Dance with My Father” is my quickest trip to [...] by Rigoberto González

The Games Poets Play August 30, 2007: Sometimes poems are riddles, hard to decipher, complex mazes with clues scattered all around to help us find our way to some understanding. The poet is taking a risk there. The more difficult the task of working out the clues, the greater should be the pay-off. There is nothing worse than that sensation of finally cracking some code and then [...] by Kwame Dawes

All Memory is Fiction, Again August 29, 2007: Don’t worry about the facts, the truth is what is important. Writers are told this all the time. There is this idea that there is a truth that transcends the facts and that we may find in what is not factual some profound truth. This is most obviously the justification for great fiction. The very name makes the point. Fiction is a cluster of [...] by Kwame Dawes

Reflectons on Porridge August 29, 2007: My grandfather lived in Lome. We drove from Ghana to Lome, waiting patiently to be waved through the Ghana/ Togo border with a sense of anticipation and excitement. From there into Lome, the European language would be French and not English, but Ewe had long been the language even deep into Ghana. Ewe stretched across the border, another example [...] by Kwame Dawes

Further Reflections (on Starsdown) August 28, 2007: In 2005 I had a part-time job in midtown, and I would walk two long blocks across 55th St. from the subway to this office building (mechanically reaching into my bag for my ID card/barcode, without breaking my stride, as it came into view). There was little to recommend this stretch of parking garages, restaurants, delis. A whimsical umbrella [...] by Ange Mlinko

Finding Poems August 27, 2007: In 1995, Rosalie Richardson was one of the women I interviewed in Sumter about their lives growing up in Jim Crow, South Carolina. These stories have been a rich source of music and insight for me. But sometimes I return to their voices, just as they spoke to me, to remind me of the grace and poetry inherent in the cadence, the syntax and the care [...] by Kwame Dawes

Half a List August 26, 2007: Technically speaking, can there ever be half a list? Lists of ten are a form more ingrained than sonnets. Here are 5 books being shuffled and reshuffled on my desk—at the risk of sounding blurbish— Jasper Bernes, Starsdown “The following are urban samples uncovered during crisis drills.” Thus begins our ride through a visionary L.A. As a [...] by Ange Mlinko

The Dark Night of the Soul August 26, 2007: Take me where the light is John Mayer I have still not worked out quite why the recent Time Magazine article on Mother Teresa’s book of private correspondence, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, has fascinated me so much without my even reading it. The obvious reason could have to do with my interest in matters of the human experience of faith, [...] by Kwame Dawes

Apropos of Nothing August 25, 2007: In 1973 I entered high school. That year, my school, Jamaica College, did not play in the schools’ football (read soccer) contest—in fact, no school did. That year the entire season had been suspended for reasons I can’t recall right now. Something had happened the year before, and so there was no season. But there were games. And the [...] by Kwame Dawes

Judges, Editors and Poetry Manuscripts: Some Musings August 24, 2007: I have been wondering how much poetry collections these days are being structured around the habits of readers of book contest entries. Someone commented some months ago, that much of the poetry published today does not come out of these contests. This is quite true. But I suspect that many first books these days are published through contests. It [...] by Kwame Dawes