The Aloe of Evening by John Knoepfle. Indian Paintbrush Poets, 2015. In his 23rd book of poetry, Springfield poet John Knoepfle uses his voice – customarily cagey and perhaps even more intimate than usual – to deliver quietly crucial insights about what it is to be a thoughtful nonagenarian in the U.S. in the 21st […]
Rodd Whelpley
Posted inArts & Culture
Carefully crafted poems of imagery
Judging from his new book of poetry From Delancey West (forthcoming by BlazeVOX [books]), Springfield poet Brian Jackson will not be poetry slamming any time soon. This is no insult. This is just to say that Jackson’s work situates him squarely as an Imagist and a worthy follower of Guillaume Apollinaire and Ezra Pound. That’s […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Putting the story in history
The Beloit University Press has just released Volume One of Springfield writer Jacqueline Dougan Jackson’s planned three-volume opus The Round Barn – The Biography of an American Farm. It is the first step toward realizing Jackson’s original vision of the work after Northwestern University press excerpted from this “big book” Stories from the Round Barn […]
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Friend’s Toothfairy Poem
The most dangerous gameIs Tooth FairyA terrible bargainIn your moist palmA SacagaweaUnder his pillowA shard of boneAnd if, at the wrong moment,You coughOr a nightmare wakes himOr the dog growlsOr, or, or . . .Then magic absents itselfFrom yet another worldMaybe hisBut most certainly yours
Posted inArts & Culture
Booty call
Untitled Document You don’t expect a story that begins: “The brassiere is off, Louella” to gently break your heart, and that’s precisely what makes Springfield writer Carol Manley’s first collection of short stories irresistible. Church Booty, the runner-up for the third annual Tartt Fiction Award, has just been published by the University of West Alabama’s […]
Posted inNews
Father Christmas
Green Christmas bulb. Blue Christmas bulb. Green bulb. Blue bulb. Green bulb. Blue bulb. When I was a boy, my mother — blue bulb — insisted that the tree — green bulb — always be blue spruce and strung — blue bulb — with only two alternating — green bulb — colors. Blue bulb. Green […]
