October 2018
Poetry Editor
Dorian Brooks wrote the two poems “Thalassa” and “Poetry Editor” in memory of her friend and fellow poet Mary Rice, who died in 2011. Originally from Louisville, Kentucky, Mary Rice was an essayist and videographer as well as a poet; her poems, articles, and reviews were published in several magazines, including Ms. and Sojourner. A feminist and proud graduate of all-women Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA, USA, she also held a master's degree in art history from Boston University. She was an editor of the feminist magazine Second Wave, and later, poetry editor of Ibbetson Street…
Thalassa
Dorian Brooks wrote the two poems “Thalassa” and “Poetry Editor” in memory of her friend and fellow poet Mary Rice, who died in 2011. Originally from Louisville, Kentucky, Mary Rice was an essayist and videographer as well as a poet; her poems, articles, and reviews were published in several magazines, including Ms. and Sojourner. A feminist and proud graduate of all-women Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA, USA, she also held a master's degree in art history from Boston University. She was an editor of the feminist magazine Second Wave, and later, poetry editor of Ibbetson Street…
September 2018
Magic Mushroom
Magic Mushroom
September 2018
Entering the park
I am greeted by
a giant yellow mushroom
sprouting brilliant from
an ash tree’s trunk,
bursting with multiple shelves,
a proudly swelling corolla.
My first thought:
someone has tied a celebratory rose
around that tree,
for yesterday the trunk was bare.
But stepping closer
I can see
it’s Chicken of the Woods.
Mother Nature has worked her magic
and left
a gift from Gaea
to lift my spirits,
wake me from my worries
and call me loudly:
attend to the world around you!
Walking on
to the pulse of the cricket,
the hum of cicadas,
and into the…
July 2018
Fairy Tales
Fairy Tales
Dorian Brooks wrote this poem about a class she took in Harvard Extension School, taught by a legendary professor at Harvard and the University of Massachusetts Boston. Bob Spaethling was also one of my Doktorväter and a mentor to me for much of my career. Many readers may also have known him, and we hope that all will enjoy this evocation of his magic in the classroom!
Fairy Tales
for Robert Spaethling
In continuing Ed.,
we read Grimms’ fairy tales
in translation. Herr Spaethling,
Professor Emeritus,
all but dances his lectures.
With charming accent
he compares the…
June 2018
Juneteenth, 2018
Juneteenth, 2018
Walking to the park I hear
the strains of celebration –
Juneteenth!
Booming from loudspeakers
the music of jubilation echoes
across the fields.
The day that freedom came
to Texas, belated news:
the war was won and
slavery dead.
The park is full
of happy revellers,
families with their coolers,
smoking grills and wild balloons.
Their autos line the road.
I leave the pavement
and move into the woods,
no longer hear
the throbbing bass
or beating drums,
but notice with new clarity
that summer has arrived.
The green is almost overpowering –
from luxuriant grasses
weaving…