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.

‘Women Hold Up Half the Sky’

Posted on March 7, 2023 by JMN

“Women hold up half the sky” is a dictum of Mao Zedong cited by China’s current ruler, Xi Jinping, to endorse the equality of the sexes. Here’s his mission statement for the “equal” woman: “The broad number of women must … Continue reading →

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Trigger Me, Poet

Posted on March 6, 2023 by JMN

Poetry March 2023 has arrived in my box. Jenny George powers the issue to a strong start with a poem whose title, unusually, helps read it. Here are the first 4 of its 11 lines: A snake lies in the … Continue reading →

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As Sure as Dearth and Texas

Posted on March 3, 2023 by JMN

An old saying for something that’s drearily predictable is, “It’s as sure as dearth and Texas.” Dearth is so prevalent, it’s easier to name things there’s not a dearth of: inequality and bad weather come to mind. Weather can be … Continue reading →

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John Donne and Tate

Posted on March 2, 2023 by JMN

There’s a biography of John Donne I’d like to read. As a preacher he was a crowd magnet in the pulpit of Saint Paul’s in London. He wrote love poems, some laced with misogyny, and later wished he hadn’t. He … Continue reading →

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To Be or Not to Be That, Is the Question

Posted on February 22, 2023 by JMN

You’ve been punctuated! In my title, moving the pause (caesura) signaled by a comma turns Hamlet’s proposition into something different. Whatever “that” may be, being it or not being it is what’s now in play. The New York Times publishes … Continue reading →

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Can This Be Poetry? It’s Direct, Clever and Fun!

Posted on February 20, 2023 by JMN

Poetry, February 2023, celebrates William J. Harris (still living). Reading the issue’s portfolio of Harris’s poems gave me some laugh-out-loud moments. Here are two (in full): On Wearing EarsAs long as peoplecontinue to wearearsthere won’tbe muchpeace and quietin this world. … Continue reading →

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The Agony of Hamline and Macalester

Posted on February 18, 2023 by JMN

“Art need not defer to religion. If that’s no longer obvious we’ve gone astray.” (Michelle Goldberg) (Michelle Goldberg, “A Left-Leaning College Didn’t Want to Offend, So It Closed Down Her Art Show,” New York Times, 2-13-23) The story of what … Continue reading →

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Diametric ‘Scape States

Posted on February 16, 2023 by JMN

“He’s showing us in the natural world our own inner landscape,” said [collector Bernard] Lumpkin, who owns four Gavin canvases. “When you’re inhabiting a painting by Cy, you’re inhabiting a world which is simultaneously strange and familiar; real and surreal; … Continue reading →

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Verse from Two Directions

Posted on February 15, 2023 by JMN

“I tire of being made to feel smart rather than pleased.”(Peter Schjeldahl) 1. Online One finds lineated speech flowing freely, touching on themes of love, nostalgia, rage, nature, disillusionment, mortality and healing. There’s earnestness, the odd hard edge, whiffs of … Continue reading →

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‘Cucumber Sandwiches. Season with Pepper Apparently’

Posted on February 13, 2023 by JMN

My title is, in full, a text message received from a correspondent in early morning with no context. I read it silently then more attentively aloud. With growing alarm I realized it was a perfect dactylic pentameter. Rubbing sleep from … Continue reading →

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