Make It Stop: Reflections on Ghettoside and Citizen

The morning started off with a gloomy chill off the North Shore. A few chickens pecking in the yard interrupted the early morning silence. My husband and I have a newly adopted Saturday morning routine. We sink into our side-by-side wicker chairs on the lanai, share a pot of coffee, and read until noon.

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How To Write Like a Woman

As a poet who is also a woman, writing in a space that has been historically dominated by men, I’m constantly trying to understand what it means to write like a woman. Is it the content of domesticity, chock-full of ironing boards, plated dinners, and brooms that make a poem “feminine”? Is it the language of the hyper-lyrical, the presence of the confessional “I,” or the omission of gender signifiers? Is women’s writing concerned only with the body and skin? Is women’s poetry political, or is it apolitical? Is it gurlesque, grotesque, or something else?

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Talent or Whatever

There are many interesting side conversations that came up in response to Ryan Boudinot’s horrific and self-indulgent critique of his MFA students. If you haven’t read it, waste a few minutes by going here, or just read my response for a short summary of his Goddard bash-fest.

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