The monthly link-o-rama is on the late side because I’ve been busy writing 30 Poems in November as a fundraiser for the Center for New Americans, an immigrant literacy and job training nonprofit in Northampton. I’ve got another $134 to go towards my target amount. Chip in today and receive a cute picture of my
November Links Roundup: Angels and Dirtbags Read More »
I had a bunch of links for the monthly roundup, but nothing seems as important as babies dying in incubators at bombed hospitals in Gaza. So I’m going to add my two shekels to a topic that is provoking volleys of cancellations and counter-cancellations in our current discourse. I used to commend my Jewish heritage
The Trauma of Israel-Palestine Read More »
Friend of the blog Tom W. Taylor a/k/a The Poet Spiel may be in his 80s, but his appetite for life remains strong, as the comic-horror poem below demonstrates. Have a tasty spooky season. glut six plate-size blueberry pancakes, a half dozen eggs sunny side up and a pound of bacon and sausage serve as
The Poet Spiel: “Glut” Read More »
I love horror. Not gore, so much, but the creepy stuff. Give me dark family psychology (gee I wonder why), cursed objects from dusty archives, the uncanny blankness of our modern built environment and the soulless things lurking beneath its plastic surfaces. Lately I’m especially drawn to historical atrocities with a supernatural twist, a sub-genre
Spooktober Reading Roundup Read More »
Happy Spooktober! Pumpkins by Shane. My inner 12-year-old would like to remind you that October 2 is the 571st birthday of King Richard III. Follow efforts to clear his name at The Missing Princes Project. 78 degrees is how hot it’s expected to be today in Northampton. Thanks, global warming! It’s also a reference to
October Links Roundup: 78 Degrees Read More »
I like the midrashic commentary structure in fiction as much as anyone. Heck, I’m currently debating with my publisher how many different typefaces we can use in my next novel to set off the main first-person narrative from the invented “documents” fleshing out the story. Give me those footnotes that argue with the text; those
Meta-Fiction’s Diminishing Returns Read More »
The wheel of the year turns again. Back to school for Shane, end of school for me: I finished my coursework for Year Two in the Temple of Witchcraft Mystery School. Now that I’m not receiving long assignments every month, I hope to spend more time playing with my collage art materials and exploring how
September Links Roundup: Book Art and Backlash Read More »
Friend of the blog The Poet Spiel tells me he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 1996 and wrote this flash essay in 2000. What’s the secret of his immortality, I wonder? Could be his bawdy sense of humor! Details You Just Can’t Live Without Nurse Jonesy is rushed and red-faced as she wheels
The Poet Spiel: “Details You Just Can’t Live Without” Read More »
If anyone was primed to love the Barbie movie, it was me. But I didn’t. Sure, I got a kick out of the dazzling pink re-creation of Barbie’s homes and outfits, and the jokes about obscure and ill-advised real Mattel dolls, like boob-growing Skipper and pregnant Midge. Somebody has to buy me a Palm Beach
Hot Pink Heteropessimism Read More »
It is I, your professional transsexual, here to wish you a Happy National Goat Cheese Month. First up on our appetizer platter of links, historian Hugh Ryan (When Brooklyn Was Queer) asks “Who’s Afraid of Social Contagion?” in this Boston Review essay about our ever-evolving concepts of sexuality and gender. “Are there actually more queer
August Links Roundup: We’re Here to Recruit You Read More »