Tayari Jones’ novel Silver Sparrow tells itself in memory and present, retrospect and retelling. The prose simply happens. It slips underneath and into you. Moves you from inside. Poised in history but set in the intimacy of individuals, Jones calls forward icons and minutiae with equal reverie. Her details are invocations, passages through which characters […]
y sin que olviden sus típicas arañas… José Alfredo Jiménez If you’d have known the fame these suckers had, you wouldn’t have ushered so many outdoors when you’ve found them posted up perpendicular to the floor in the shadow on the back of your dresser, or in the perpetually dusky corner of your shower stall. […]
Poem This installment draws down against William Carlos Williams’s Spring and All, specifically, XXI: “The Red Wheelbarrow”. You know this. so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens. and so: CounterPoem define this(object) (reference self whole) or (reference not that) define was(subject object) (is past tense) or (used […]
On a cold February morning in 2010, I found myself at a tall office building near 50th St. and 3rd Avenue in New York City. I’d been there before, in a dream possibly. The main lobby had rows and rows of elevators with different destinations. I entered one. It was gold-plated and warmer than the […]
by Tom Bair I can’t find New York. I’ve looked everywhere. It’s okay though. I’m not too worried. I lose things all the time, and so . . . so I’ve picked up many methods of recovery along the way. Retracing my steps, cleaning, doing something else, pacing furiously, crying, etc. Or I’ll check the […]
by Frannie M. In a dream last night my teeth were a mess. It fell into a few categories of “Teeth” dreams in 10,000 Dreams Interpreted (ed. Miller). The dream had loose teeth in it; that means “there will be failures and gloomy tidings.” The dream had my teeth falling out in it; that means […]
Conscientious inhabitants of art-spaces – makers, collectors, readers, and so on – respond to an intersection between expressive position and functional affect. This is a fancy way of saying that we care about the other people involved in artistic processes. But since, according to our common senses, it’s not what you say but how you […]
Una Vision del Futuro, Sin Titulo by Zev Gottdiener First there is a mountain/then there is no mountain/then there is! – Donavan Man does not speak because he thinks; he thinks because he speaks. Or rather, speaking is no different than thinking: to speak is to think. -Octavio Paz You’re sitting in a restaurant with […]
by Alec Horowitz Four Stars If there is a word to describe Monsieur Lazhar that word is compassion. That’s certainly what the teacher has for his students throughout this picture. This isn’t just a story about a good teacher. It’s a story about a good man as well, who is dealing with his own grief […]
