Category Archives: Uncategorized

In this extraordinary moment when we are gathering ourselves up from the years of a pandemic, a war is now ravaging Ukraine and, like all wars, the world beyond. April is poetry month. What can a poet say? As poets, … Continue reading →

Holding on is the work of this day. We are all trying to keep track, stay steady, manage our everything. And then we spill something, arrive late, can’t remember. The pandemic, the war, the social rifts we struggle to process … Continue reading →

Beginning a novel is like the start of a romance with the spark and daydreams we enter, and a world newly created. Middles are like creating our own maps, the kind early explorers made who half believed they might fall … Continue reading →

Last week a storm snapped off the top of a 100-ft white pine and slammed it down behind my house, pinning the back door shut. Remarkably, nothing was damaged. I now have a giant octopus with 30-ft limbs sprawled across … Continue reading →

Amazement:  From maze Old English. Overwhelm, confound with sudden surprise or wonder. Stunned, dazed, bewildered. Stupefied, irrational, foolish. Wonderful. Astonished. Overwhelming wonder. A while ago my life contained enough difficulties to give me serious pause and feel weighed down. I … Continue reading →

A few weeks ago I had the thrill of watching and listening to a conversation between Ann Patchett and Louise Erdrich. Both women are formidable writers, and the conversation focused on Louise Erdrich’s latest book, The Sentence, but they are … Continue reading →

On October 3, 2021, I was invited to speak at the end of the Amherst Writers & Artists Professional Development Retreat. Specifically, I was asked to talk about an addition to the essential practices that constitute the AWA Method. Not … Continue reading →

Who are you talking to? It was the question I would get asked when I was small. So I learned not to talk out loud, but to keep my stories inside. Then I learned to write. But the thing is, … Continue reading →

For the past eight years I have taught a two-week, summer poetry class for high school students. Every summer I watched them interact, share jokes and music, the bolder ones including the quieter ones, the romantics entrancing the skeptics. Last … Continue reading →

I had the privilege of writing with a group of middle school students recently. As soon as the two leaders of the group began their Power Point presentation on plot, I knew I was going to learn something. According to … Continue reading →