An Italian-American Writer & Poet with a Yankee Outsider Perspective
Crime and Punishment in Chernobyl – Svetlana Alexievich’s “Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster” I bought a copy of Voices from Chernobyl when I read that the author, Svetlana Alexievich had won the Nobel Prize in Literature. But eventually, even … Continued
An Ozark Family: Wesley McNair’s The Lost Child (Part 1 of 3) When we first moved to Kansas City, Missouri, years ago, the city seemed not much different from cities I’d known on the east coast. That is, until one … Continued
A Certain Slant of Light In third grade, when I couldn’t see the board, I got glasses. Suddenly every hair, every whisker on our cat shone. I spied dust on the chalkboard erasers. My mother developed wrinkles. I needed a … Continued
Though I supposed myself a serious graduate student, studying 19th-Century American Literature at Columbia, it now comes clear that I took away only one snippet from what that century had to offer–Emily Dickinson brief remark: A little bird walked down … Continued
I just came home from la bel’Italia, specifically three cities: Orte, Arezzo, and Florence. I’ve never been to Orte and Arezzo before, Florence, however, many many times. As part-Italian, and an art-lover, as a happy speaker of even limited Italian, … Continued
Late Summer Tears You don’t have to weep with me–not wrenching sobs at any rate, just a slow seep of wet, honoring the clouds of green and scimitars of swallows twittering against high blue. Mornings on the deck with black and … Continued
Dear Mayor Coleman, a bevy of city workers met me at the cottonwood tree this afternoon – if bevy is quite the word to include a burly Public Works guy. There they all were, kind, and informative. What seemed to … Continued
I used to believe that I was the young Mozart. This came about when I read his biography, a book with an orange cover, sitting in my father’s huge, over-stuffed chair, during the heat of a South Carolina summer. When … Continued
Dear Music Lovers, the Twin Cities now has two dueling orchestras back on stage. Well, not exactly dueling, but at least playing at each other across the river. I could not be happier, though I rarely cross the great divide … Continued
We have two sensibilities in this house–my husband’s deep-rooted radicalism. He went to prison during Vietnam not just as a draft dodger, but as a draft refuser. I didn’t know him them. Now he reads The Nation. During Vietnam I … Continued