An Interview with Poet Tina Mozelle Braziel
We talk about her book, Known by Salt, over at The Drunken Odyssey. (Photo courtesy of Bang Images.)
A Kiss Risks a Prince: Recent Reading
Known by Salt: Tina Mozelle BrazielA fantastic debut by an Alabama writer. I won’t say much here as I’m in the process of getting my thoughts in order for an interview with the author. She’s really busy these days. If you like poetry of place, then I think you’ll like this […]
Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome to the Party Zone: Recent Viewing
When Kanopy sent an email celebrating their Joel Potrykus collection it didn’t mean anything to me until I scrolled down far enough to see that he had made a favorite of mine, The Alchemist Cookbook (2016). Ultimately, I fell for the promotion and decided to check out another one. Then […]
My Earliest Poetry Experiences + An Exercise + A Poem
Shel Silverstein wrote the first poems I remember reading and they were frequently silly, but it was a silliness that kept me reading all of his work, some of which, is not so silly. Between Silverstein and MAD Magazine, I cane to enjoy language that had a sense of humor, […]
Verbing Nicias and Other Sundry from Plutarch’s Lives
In the ancient world, being a fierce warrior wasn’t enough. Nicias was known as a strong soldier, but a careful general, which was not smiled upon at the time. In fact, it earned him scorn. Aristophanes, who also famously lampooned Socrates, made him a verb. It’s awkwardly translated sometimes as […]
Little Billboards #6
Sometimes I can’t tellif she’s eating yogurt ortubes of clown makeup.
Little Billboards #9
Her hand cups the rain,while my ears cup her laughter.Then–daylight thunder.
Omit Heedless Words: The Elements of Style According to Emma Woodhouse
Pride and Prejudice has been a favorite novel since college. I found it a difficult, rewarding book. I found the prose difficult initially, but I kept reading because I enjoyed the Bennetts so much. I read Pride and Prejudice at least four times before it dawned on me that I […]
The Shilling of a Sacred Deer: Plutarch’s Sertorius and The White Fawn
I’ve mentioned my current long-term reading project is Plutarch’s Parallel Lives and how enjoyable the passages on Archimedes were. Another favorite sequence is on Quintus Sertorius. If you’ve read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, then you’ve already got an idea of what kind of guy Sertorius was: a statesman, a member of […]
