Zen is a term that is bandied around in common language with great freedom. Here, a Zen practitioner and artist, Eden Maxwell, author of “An Artist Empowered: Define and Establish Your Value as an Artist—Now” tells us how these realms interconnect. Riehlife: What does Zen Buddhism have to do with art? Eden Maxwell: The source…
Meet Stephen Kuusisto Professor, Author, Speaker, Blogger, Disability Advocate…POET. The Mockingbird on Central for Connie by Stephen Kuusisto Only Bread, Only Light This bird who lands in the oak tree Is both a comedian and a natural fact: In a hundred-years house We awaken to a sweet thing, A motor of avian laughter Ten feet…
Riehlife’s April poetry editor for National Poetry Month Stephanie Farrow is a fine poet in her own right and a close friend since we served in Peace Corps Ghana in the 1970s. Stephanie selected these Adinkra poems by A. Kayper-Mensah (Sankofa: Adinkra Poems) Stephanie tells us: Adinkra symbols are pictographs that reflect a specific proverb…
Because You Asked about the Line Between Prose and Poetry by Howard Nemerov from “Sentences” Sparrows were feeding in a freezing drizzle That while you watched turned to pieces of snow Riding a gradient invisible From silver aslant to random, white, and slow. There came a moment that you couldn’t tell. And then they clearly…
When Mary Oliver read in St. Louis at Art & Soul Cafe, Christ Church Cathedral in December 8th at 1210 Locust Street, downtown, a group of 200 hushed Mary Oliver fans gathered to hear her read. It was thrilling to be in her presence and in the assembly of her devotees. —JGR PRAYING by Mary…
In honor of the 40th anniversary of the assassination of the great civil right’s leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Riehlife offers Langston Hughes’ poem “Democracy.” —JGR _________________________ Democracy by Langston Hughes Democracy will not come Today, this year Nor ever Through compromise and fear. I have as much right As the other fellow has To…
Sankofa is an Adinkra Symbol from Ghana meaning “Return and Fetch It.” Click here to read Riehlife post from December 5, 2007 on how Sankofa has defined the path of my life. The SANKOFET is a poetry form created by the Sisters-Nineties Literary Group. The format has three verses or stanzas of seven lines each….
Painting by Joseph Lamarque (see profile under Art Matters) Vladimir Nabokov’s poem was suggested by my friend Leigh Davidson as our poem of the day.–JGR Nabokov’s Butterflies: Unpublished and Uncollected Writings No, life is no quivering quandary! No, life is no quivering quandary! Here under the moon things are bright and dewy. We are the…
I’ve known rivers: I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers. This is the first stanza of one of my favorite poems “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” by Langston Hughes (from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes,…
Click here to read about the Festival of the Cranes at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in Soccorro, New Mexico November Idyll: After the still life Leviticus 7:12-15 by David Lee (from Orion Magazine, November/December 2007) Above the grain field stubble a lift of cranes like a great table cloth shaken. _____________________ “The poet’s…