In the News -- the Front Page and Beyond

What's my favorite section of the Sunday paper?

Not the front page, for sure. Likewise, sports and business don't do it for me.

On Sunday mornings, the first thing I want to read is the New York Times wedding section.

This is not because I'm wedding-crazy. My own was lovely, but to be honest, I didn't have strong opinions about its planning. While it's true that as a kid I liked dressing my favorite Barbie in a full white gown, it's not the trappings of a ceremony and reception -- the clothes, the flowers, the cake -- that's so appealing.

It's the love stories that interest me. The way a couple met. How they were just friends at first or didn't even like each other much. Or how they knew each other in high school, but didn't connect until two decades and divorces later.

Yes, the atrocities on the front page are happening. Yes, we need to know what's going on.

But love is happening, too. It's real. Married love. Same-sex love. Parent-child love. Neighborly love. Love of plants and pets and painting, of doing good work for society. Love that transcends the fences of faith and race. Love is as real as fire and bullets and shady campaign contributions. Love is a fact, part of the truth equation that's often regarded as frivolity, not real news.

That's why so many of my stories and poems are about love. That's why when I first saw the Poetry Box's submission call for poems from the news, I was sure I would spin the theme on its head and write a quirky, inspiring piece about the Sunday wedding section. I knew for certain I didn't want to write about the misery that's all around us. And there was no way I was going to write about guns.

And then I did.

I have columbine flowers growing in my front yard, and every spring when their slender stalks start to rise, I'm reminded of the shootings at Columbine High School in 1999, when my own children were young and just beginning their lives. As horrific as the topic of mass shootings is, I had to write about it.

I'm honored that my poem "Columbine," as well as a new piece on homelessness, will be included in the Poetry Box's In the News anthology, which will be published in September 2018.

This volume is packed with stellar work by Carolyn Martin, Tricia Knoll, Sharon Wood Wortman and many, many others, including my beloved friend Lindy Low Le Coq -- all poets trying to make sense of today's world, all poets who remind me what it means to stay alive and loving and connected.

To order a copy of In the News, click http://thepoetrybox.com/bookstore/the-poeming-pigeon-in-the-news.

Yes, Your Words Matter!

Gram and me in her backyard in the Mt. Tabor neighborhood.

Thanks to the editors of Postcard Poems and Prose for publishing my poem "Blue Dress." You can see it here.

The poem is about my grandmother, a tough lady who lived to be 101 and who was also extremely kind and generous. A champion of my literary aspirations, she paid for my first writing class and also bought me a printer when mine went on the blink.

I heard about this fine journal from my good friend Lindy, another strong, inspiring woman. Here's a link to her work, which beautifully combines writing and photography.

One of my adult writing students recently told me she wanted to write something that made a difference. I don't remember how I responded, but I wish I'd told her, "You already have." In class one morning, she read a piece about giving money to a man outside a grocery store. Like Gram's cheering me on and Lindy's creativity, that story made an impression on me. It made me think yes, I can spare some change for someone who needs food or water or just proof that passersby aren't indifferent to their existence.

I recently went to my daughter's college graduation. Expecting to sit through a long, dull commencement address, I was surprised to find myself riveted by the dynamic speech Michael Alexander, the Interim Vice President of Global Diversity & Inclusion at Portland State University, gave. In a time when so many people are shouting, this soft-spoken man made a powerful statement about the problems of poverty and shootings and racism in a way that left my family and I awed and determined to answer his call to action.

The day after the ceremony, my husband and I left for our pilgrimage to Glasgow, where his father was born in 1922. Walking around the university there, we saw a multitude of waving banners that bore the words “World Changers,” and I felt heartened that the school was openly asking its students to do more than pursue a comfortable life made possible by a lucrative career. 

Bad news is literally streaming in our ears, but inspiration is there, too, and its messenger could be anyone – a relative, a friend, a stranger, a student or you.