I'm taking another workshop through Tweetspeak Poetry called Writing Toward Joy and led by the incomparable Megan Willome. We are working our way through Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time by making florilegia--bouquets of sparkling text that we create out of sentences that jump out at us. We then try to see what new connections we can make out of those or what deeper beauty we can find. We're also practicing a form lectio divina and writing poetry. Seriously, if you've never taken a TSP … [Read More...]

First Words Friday: Week 6 – 2019 – Literary America
I bought this book--A Journey Through Literary America--as a gift to myself directly from the website, on sale and autographed. But it's also available on Amazon. It's "a literary pilgrimage in … [Read More...]

First Words Friday: Week 5 – 2019 – Braiding Sweetgrass
I'm all about nature writing, especially when the words are woven as beautifully as they are in this book, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by … [Read More...]

First Words Friday: Week 4 – 2019 – Anne Morrow Lindbergh
I have to stuff marked-up (red inked, blue inked, yellow highlighted, and penciled) page chunks back whenever I pick it up. I've loved well my Twentieth Anniversary paperback edition of Anne Morrow … [Read More...]

First Words Friday: Week 3 – 2019 – Mary Oliver
The evening of January 17, 2018, I posted the above photo with this quote: “And mostly I’m grateful that I take this world so seriously.” ~Mary Oliver in “The Gift." My Facebook and Instagram … [Read More...]

First Words Friday – Week 2 – 2019
Last week I shared some first words from A House in the Sky by Amanda Lindhout and Sara Corbett, a book on my to-read list.This week I'm sharing from one of my favorite books, one I've read and reread … [Read More...]

Commit Poetry: Let Evening Come by Jane Kenyon
Tweetspeak Poetry has formed a "By Heart" Community, and we are memorizing a poem each month. For December it was "Let Evening Come" by Jane Kenyon. Having lived for years in the country and walked … [Read More...]
Commit Poetry

Anna Akhmatova and Friends
When Anatoly Nayman recounts his first meeting with the Russian poet, Anna Akhmatova, he describes her gesture of hospitality. The woman who had let me into the flat brought in a saucer on … [Read More...]

Commit Poetry: Tapping on the Walls
What about tapping on the walls? Imagine a 5 x 5 square numbered 1 to 5 horizontally along the top and vertically down the left side. Picture the letters of the alphabet running in order … [Read More...]
Dared

Dared: To Paint a Wall Chartreuse
Chartreuse. The color of your creativity. That phrase pinged around my head this morning. I wrote it on an index card, attributed it to L.L. Barkat, and pinned it to my bulletin … [Read More...]

Dared: A 30-Mile Bike Ride and a Request
I've gone and dared myself again. Back in December my cardiologist told me I needed to lose some weight. Sigh... I know that, but he's the first doctor who ever called me out. In the past … [Read More...]