February 3, 2019
It’s not all in our DNA, a lot of who we are as adults comes from the cultural imprint of our families and social supports as we grow up. A lot of my cultural imprinting came from my maternal grandmother, who did the better part of raising me as my mother was an alcoholic and […]
December 13, 2016
Poetry was never meant to be parked in academia. Too dry. Too proper. Too overdone. Real poetry is more raw. As real as a flag at half mast hanging limp above dirty snow gathered on a concrete palette under a gray winter sky. Poetry doesn’t belong on a pedestal, it should be better grounded. Experience put […]
August 25, 2016
Visiting family in Virginia and the lead story on the D.C. noon news is that 8 people die per day in OH from opioid overdoses, more than 3000 this year. Watched my home state fall in line with other troubled places in the world, Italy, Syria, Nigeria, and . . . Ohio. Just finished […]
May 30, 2016
We all come into this world crying, “me, me, me.” Insistent cries of my bottle, my grapes, my toys gradually (hopefully) grow into a feeble understanding of the concept of compromise. We call this turning point adolescence. Teaching adolescents requires that we help awaken kids to the awareness that there is a world on the […]
February 20, 2016
There’s a bit of magical thinking around the whole topic of mentor text, particularly when it comes to poetry.
January 11, 2016
Let’s face it, studying the writing of the Constitution can be a real snooze fest.
January 7, 2016
Will the writing be good enough? Will I look foolish? Is it what the teacher wants? What if it’s not right? The internal conversation of the blocked writer.
January 7, 2016
“The more specific your story, the more universal the message.” I’m not sure who said that first, but it is one of those truisms that keeps me revising and revising – always for more detail.
