I'm working on either a very long poem, or a series of poems that would live in a section or even become an entire chapbook. All about my brother. My older brother, by 4 years, was always an intense guy: brilliant, talented, charming, funny. And angry. He and I grew a lot closer when I went to college and was at home still trying to figure out what he wanted to be when he grew up. We had many epic conversations about philosophy, religion, literature, art. Enriching chats that

Years ago, I wrote a poem about ferns. It was after my separation from my first husband and I was feeling lush and angry. I think of these lines often: The ferns though, those unapologetic Fuck Yous, little manifestos of how finished I am with him are lush, wild. Thank goodness the anger is gone, though I still have my moments (wish there were more) of feeling lush. Ferns find their way into my poems frequently. Here they are in another poem: At the beginning of a small outc

In creating this site, I re-visited the 2 Lefty Blondie Press features on me and while both were helpful reminders about my process and where I derive poetic-energy from, this one, about writing as play, was a reminder I really needed today. I read Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi years ago and it took me a long time to fuel my writing with a play-mentality. Like 20+ years. I live with a chronic illness that includes a great deal of chroni

I talk to my process journal and ask it questions

I wrote a very long answer in my writing process journal to writer Jami Attenberg's post/question Why I Write. And I realized a practice I've been doing for ages around my writing: having book-companions for certain projects. It makes sense; I'm a librarian so books mean a lot to me. I remember going to Vermont Study Center waaaaay back in 2003 and I had to bring a ton of books with me (luckily my father let me borrow his Chevy Blazer for the 13-hour drive from Pittsburgh to

I recently finished the longest poem I've ever written modeled after one of my very favorit poems, Li-Young Lee's The City in Which I Love you. It's a poem that breaks down the moments before my wedding and cracks open the relationship I've had with my husband up until that moment. I’d been working on it for over a year. 20 years ago, I was obsessed with fractals about and before I took the long (13-year!) pause from writing, my work was kind of fractal-heavy and science-y. A