“Oh, Mary!” begins at a fever pitch – loud, over the top, brassy – and stays that way. Imagine Mary Todd Lincoln as a frustrated cabaret dancer and her husband as a frustrated gay man, each part played to comic…
Pepper and Poems
111 Articles
111
A grocery chain in Iceland – Bónus Supermarkets – began selling a slim volume of poetry at its counters on eternal “special offer” several decades ago. It became the best-selling volume of poetry in the history of Iceland, and I…
I’ve taken myself to the beach for the first time in a long while: craving the sea. It does not disappoint, doing the same thing it always does. Keeping its promises. Today, holding its temper: a cheerful churn at the…
Seen at the North Carolina Botanical Garden, and Recently Spring ran wild loose ribbons in her hair a riot of pink and purple and red and yellow and blue. One day, she knew, she’d leap into the strong green arms…
Read this Mary Oliver poem at your own risk, friends. I had forgotten that Oliver can be so gruesome as she pins down the butterfly… The Rabbit Scatterghost, it can’t float away. And the rain, everybody’s brother, won’t help. And…
On a Snow-Kissed Day, A Question Why do we feed the birds? Tell me, friend, and maybe then I’ll know what I need to know. The Sherman brothers – Richard and Robert – wrote “Feed the Birds” for the 1964…
Sometimes even Mary Oliver has to get a little firm. The Poet With His Face in His Hands You want to cry aloud for your mistakes. But to tell the truth the world doesn’t need any more of that sound….
Here’s something to make time for on a cold Sunday morning in late fall, battening down the hatches for winter… Postscript by Seamus Heaney And some time make the time to drive out west Into County Clare, along the Flagg…
Found on the blacktop this week: beauty, chaos, relationship. Togetherness and pulling apart, coziness, grief, brokenness, comfort, joyful gatherings, estrangement, dancing. Seeking. The wind blows and it all changes. What did you see on your blacktop? On mine – it…