Stay tuned.

 Why does one take time away from work, family, and the status quo to fly across a mountain range in Colorado, straight through a rainbow, and thwack onto the tarmac where a lightening storm keeps her grounded for another hour in anticipation of whatever is to come? 

The answer, I think, has something to do with finding the restorative energy to return to all of these wonders and to see them, perhaps in a new light. 

What I took away from Aspen Words this year was not the editor or agent whose calling was to launch my career (poets, I can hear you all laughing), but the peace of mind that literature, in all of its myriad forms, can and does still matter. 

Today,  I am grateful for having shared a week with each of you. You have given me each a lifetime of wonder.

​Thank you, Aspen. And thank you, words.

Click to watch video.

For six weeks, I will have the opportunity to bring to completion a collection of short stories.  My critics?  The trees and the lake.  I am feeling humbled and slightly intimidated, in the best possible way. (I also love the fact that I am a "no-name" author.) ;) Cheers to all of us who haven't yet found our names.

Visit 1888.center to learn about upcoming events in music, visual arts, and literature.  I am so proud of you, Kevin Staniec, and the 1888 team.

This past week has been divided between the White Mountain School, by day, for poetry workshops and Robert Frost's barn, by night, for poetry readings.  It has been an honor to have worked alongside so many talented poets this week who also, coincidentally, have turned out to be some pretty awesome companions.  Thank you, The Frost Place, and my workshop. 

Narrative storytelling in Fullerton, CA @8 PM at Max Bloom's.  I'll be sharing the spotlight with poet Bryan Banuelos and all the wonderful folks who come out regularly the first Saturday of each month.  Get your story on!
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Okay, maybe not every fan of Virgil will love this, but after spending five years reading the Aeneid and five months translating Books I and IV, this fan of Virgil is willing to trade him up for a new kind of epic that exchanges the depth of time for the depth of the human psyche.  And the sound of it?--well it downright makes the rest of it go down.  McBride's  words will rock you into a stupor, not unlike a state of paralysis, in which for the first the time--if your heart is stronger than your stomach and if you are one of those who may be able not only to squish grammar between your toes but relish the gooey feeling of what is left--the world awaits you, untrammeled siren in the raw. 

​Reading: links to my reading of a few lines from Lesser Bohemians
Commets: links to my humble opinion of those same few lines from Lesser Bohemians