Tag Archives: poetry

Sharon Olds: ‘I Want You Hour and Hour in My Line of Sight’

Posted on April 18, 2023 by JMN

Sharon Olds’s poem is called “To You, from Your Secret Admirer,” and it’s part of the selection contained in Poetry April 2023. It’s the steamiest poem I’ve read since encountering Louise Labé in college French and learning the ramifications of … Continue reading →

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Sharon Olds: ‘Nothing False Will Be Spoken’

Posted on April 16, 2023 by JMN

I traversed Sharon Olds’s selection of poems in Poetry (April 2023) fresh in the morning and they entered me fluently, with almost no friction. It’s a rare and wonderful reading experience where POMAG fare is concerned. This has happened to … Continue reading →

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‘All Good Writers Think They Suck’

Posted on April 14, 2023 by JMN

My title quotes a spicy remark by Harlan Coben on a British talk show aired on March 24th. He continued: “Only bad writers think they’re good. We all get beat up. We all have impostor syndrome.” Coben’s comments contrast pertly … Continue reading →

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Foobar to Fix ‘They’

Posted on April 12, 2023 by JMN

To automate Spanish verb conjugation with Java code I created variables to hold the gamut of subject pronouns available to English and Spanish. Here were the varieties of “you”: String youS = null; // “you” singular familiar = “tú”String YouS … Continue reading →

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‘I Am on the Side of Tears’

Posted on March 31, 2023 by JMN

“All we can do now is pray.” Famous last words. Prayer is the recourse of the desperate when there’s no recourse. It’s the last croak from the isthmus of the fauces before humanity lies facedown in the mud. When you … Continue reading →

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Ann Lauterbach’s ‘Blue Door’: It’s Open

Posted on March 27, 2023 by JMN

THE BLUE DOOR(Ann Lauterbach, Poetry March 2023) The obligatory cancels its strophe. Let me get a grip,and begin in this other patch where the air is. “I caught a whiff of poem on the wind straightaway, which is an exceedingly … Continue reading →

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Pausing With Your Eyes

Posted on March 25, 2023 by JMN

I’ve looked into what the exaggerated gaps between words or phrases in lines of verse are all about, curious whether or not they should affect my reading and, if so, how. A writer named Emilia Phillips calls them visual caesuras … Continue reading →

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‘I Discovered That the Act of Writing Is Also an Act of Drawing’

Posted on March 21, 2023 by JMN

Lebanese-American painter-poet-novelist Etel Adnan (1925-2021) was interviewed by Gabriel Coxhead for the June 2018 issue of Apollo. I’m drawn to her work for how it mingles Arabic language, painting and poetry. Quoting from the interview: Perhaps most interesting, in terms … Continue reading →

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Ann Lauterbach’s ‘Door’: Trouble Me, Poet

Posted on March 20, 2023 by JMN

A noun or pronoun, with a participle in agreement, may be put in the ablative to define the time or circumstances of an action. This construction is called the Ablative Absolute… The Ablative Absolute is an adverbial modifier of the … Continue reading →

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Arabic Poetry Note: A. J. Arberry (1905-1969)

Posted on March 17, 2023 by JMN

Given the exiguous outbound appeal I muster, I work hard at not being longwinded. I revel, though, in venting puffs of comment on my adventure with Arabic and its poetry. A.J. Arberry’s essential anthology of 31 poets spans a period … Continue reading →

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