I woke up this morning smelling like the perfume of the friend I hugged last night. Thinking: this is humanity, the bleed of one life into another, the carrying of each other’s stories on our bodies, in our hair. It’s been 10 years since 9/11, and I’ve been working on a piece all week that I’ll be reading this afternoon. … Read More
Inhabiting the authority archetype
This week, I was pretty much knocked off my feet when I peeled back the packaging from my contributor’s copy of Poet’s Market 2012 and found my own name–that oddly familiar and now, suddenly somewhat alien collection of letters–looking back at me from the cover. Poet’s Market has been my constant companion for the past 20 years, accompanying my lifelong … Read More
Poetry Prompt: Reveal Something Without a Narrative
My invitation today is to say something without actually saying it. To reveal something through a series of images, rhythms, and sounds that give us more of an experience of, or a feeling about, what happened rather than the actual facts, events and story line. The following questions are designed to help you get loose and wander into a scene … Read More
Poetry prompt: Write a poem-long metaphor
When I launched this blog, I promised that Fridays would be poetry days. And I got a bit off track these past few months. As I’m kicking back into teaching mode, I thought it would be fun to offer a poetry prompt every Friday for at least a few months. I hope you’ll play/write along! Today’s invitation: write a poem … Read More
See you at the Willamette Writers Conference today!
THE PRODUCTIVE POET workshop Successful poets live and write in alignment with their aspirations. While no two poets are striving for exactly the same results, we all have the opportunity to put solid systems, strategies and attitudes in place to keep us moving toward what we value most. Sage Cohen will share the top ten ways to exponentially increase the … Read More
Dear Luna,
I met your father today and held your painted face in my hands. Only a poet can give us our own grief in terms we can understand. As breath fills us briefly before leaving, that windswept cliff could not keep me from this slender spine of his book split between my reading hands. Your life burns through mine in metaphor, … Read More
Hachikō, Hamachi and other wonders
Before I was married, my dog Hamachi (a German Shepherd mix) slept beside me in bed, her head on the “his” pillow, her limbs intertwined with mine. When I dated a man whose Australian Shepherd also believed she belonged on the bed, I expanded to a king size bed to accommodate the four of us. Years later, my husband voted … Read More
Mother’s Day, blogging, and other ways to stretch
Yesterday, my son was gifted with a red and blue egg, each protecting its own, little wad of silly putty. The first thing he did was smoosh the two globs together into a swirly purple mash, stretch them out into “yours” and “mine” ends, and then start walking across the kitchen with his lump, while I stood in place holding … Read More
I’ll have a side of “g” with that
There is a word that appears many times in my book, spelled completely wrong: reigns. The word and meaning I intended were: reins. (As in, “Take the reins of your writing life in your own hands.”) Instead, I managed to say, approximately, “Take the (reigns) period during which a sovereign rules into your own hands.” Not at all what I … Read More
The death of the dream could be the birth of unprecedented possibility
I’ve tried to write about four different posts today. Because I don’t have the heart for any of them, they dragged. I dragged. The posts were boring and I was bored. Why all of this slow-poking around? Because I’ve been avoiding bringing to this page what is true for me today. And I because I know all too well that … Read More