Author Archives: JMN

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About JMN

I live in Texas and devote much of my time to easel painting on an amateur basis. I stream a lot of music, mostly jazz, throughout the day. I like to read and memorize poetry.

Nor Tear nor Rant, But Cogent, Urgent, Plangent Tangent

Posted on April 7, 2025 by JMN

More I can’t:The title is my tear. How did you in yourHead say tear? As in go on a tear,Or shed a tear? One rhymes with fearAnd one with bear Market. That, my friend’s,Enjambment for you. Fake news flash! A … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthology | Tagged , | 8 Comments

An Unbosoming: On Cohesion

Posted on April 6, 2025 by JMN

Wehr lists anatomical English equivalents for Arabic noun ṣadr, plural ṣudūr, as: chest, bust, breast, bosom. (Heart is an outlier, clearly metaphorical.) At a tender age I heard my grandmother refer to ladies’ “bosoms.” Context nudged me to associate “bosom” … Continue reading →

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‘the living can / be silenced the dead cannot’

Posted on April 3, 2025 by JMN

The writer who wrote the line in my title is ire’ne lara silva. Here it is in context: … they will make us all into virginmadonnas protecting mexicanidadbut our redred blood spilt on the ground does not knowhow to be … Continue reading →

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What’s in YOUR Belly?

Posted on March 30, 2025 by JMN

The Arabic phrase under examination is this (with my transliteration): وَأَصْلِحُوا۟ ذَاتَ بَيْنِكُمْ ۖwa-‘aṣliḥū ḏāt(a) bain(i)-kum In the languages I can navigate, here are various translations. All but “Cortés” are from here: Englishsettle your affairs (Dr. Mustafa Khattab, The Clear … Continue reading →

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I Need Some Writer’s Block

Posted on March 26, 2025 by JMN

Really, I should draw, paint and read more, write less. It’s a constant struggle to pipe down.  Poetry, for one thing, triggers me. Intending to read a bait of versifying, before I know it I’m a keyboard Roman candle ejaculating … Continue reading →

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Is Divine Wet Work an Anomaly or a Feature?

Posted on March 22, 2025 by JMN

After the first death there is no other. (From Dylan Thomas’s “A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London.”) A euphemism I retain from immersion in spy thriller fiction is the term “wet work.” In … Continue reading →

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Did Someone Mention Drugstore Cowboys?

Posted on March 20, 2025 by JMN

The Lone Ranger rides again! That was my first take on the photo. Then it stirred my childish you-haven’t-earned-your-Stetson attitude. I was sure the article would nudge me toward curdled cowboy hat bête noire-ism. But wait: As he cavorted across the … Continue reading →

Posted in Commentary, Quotations | Tagged , | 1 Comment

The ‘Color(ed) Theory’ of Artist Amanda Williams

Posted on March 17, 2025 by JMN

“There is something anthropomorphic about this work… I didn’t force it. That’s what made it powerful.” (Amanda Williams) In her studio, Williams experimented with her Prussian blue, layering, diluting and pouring the paint, letting it crack, pool and bleed across … Continue reading →

Posted in Quotations | Tagged , | 4 Comments

Atlas Shrugged and Put on a Hat

Posted on March 12, 2025 by JMN

“If you don’t like country music, get outta the way! Cause we’re KBUCK and we’re gonna keep comin’ atcha!” (A radio station, name disguised) In Arabic, ignorance is expressed with a verb, not a predication. It’s not a state you … Continue reading →

Posted in Commentary | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

Landscapes with High Horizon Lines, Shot Through with Blood and Shrapnel

Posted on March 9, 2025 by JMN

His layers of paint, a mudlike impasto, oil and acrylic paints mixed with raw materials like soil, iron, straw and dead leaves, form deep furrows on the canvas. These landscapes, with van Gogh’s high horizon lines, all seem to be … Continue reading →

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