This poem rose from weary astonishment at the political lies that seemed to be raining on us daily. I was at our 95-year-old cottage in northern Michigan—which literally has no foundation—trying to discourage with kindness a feral cat who was living in the crawlspace. We read cats dislike citrus. In times of upheaval and uncertainty I get through by asking myself, “OK, what do you know for sure?”
Gail Martin on "Three Lies and a Truth" |
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"An Artisan in Verse Whose Poems Shimmer and Resound"
David Orr explores This Afterlife, A. E. Stallings' selected poems. "The main thing Stallings has going for her is that she’s good at writing poems. In particular, she’s good at writing the sort of poetry that evokes the word 'good,' rather than, for instance, 'brave' or 'disorienting.' Stallings’s work imagines the poet as an artisan, and her poems satisfy in the way a handblown glass bowl satisfies; they have heft and shape; they rest solidly in the palm."
via THE NEW YORK TIMES |
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What Sparks Poetry:
Brian Henry on Tomaž Šalamun's "Sutra"
"Though Šalamun would leave the interview format behind, he continued to ask many questions in his work, sometimes building poems upon a series of questions, as in the poem featured here. Although the title, 'Sutra,' implies the imparting of wisdom or knowledge, Šalamun was more interested in the interplay between the questions and answers than in satisfying the expectations of a conventional sutra." |
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