Category Archives: musings

reshaping manuscript

At the Spalding Con manuscript workshop, let by Kathleen Driskell, she had us do many exercises to revise our poetry manuscripts. One of them involved cutting a list of our titles into separate strips and arranging them in sections with our strongest poems as bookends. The workshop has been so helpful in making my manuscriptContinue reading “reshaping manuscript”

feeling down about my poetry

Been feeling down about two things lately – a year of poetry and poetry manuscript rejections, and the fact that the publications in print journals – this poetry I’ve written to be read and enjoyed, disappears into obscurity because, really, who reads journals? So, feeling for the first time in a long time that noContinue reading “feeling down about my poetry”

the “free speech zone” is tough

In my class I’ve been working so hard to establish a “free speech zone,” but I think I goofed up when I pressed a student for evidence to back up some claims that police brutality is the same as it always has been. I believe I inhibited the students’ feeling of not being judged ratherContinue reading “the “free speech zone” is tough”

what does it mean to be colorblind?

When asked about their approach to race in America, many people will claim they are color-blind, meaning that issues of race simply don’t exist in their world view. At a recent diversity conference I attended I learned the following concepts to consider about the “color-blind” claim: The vast majority who claim to be color-blind orContinue reading “what does it mean to be colorblind?”