Marly Youmans's Blog, page 85

A story and a call for poems--

Anyone can give up, it's the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone else would understand if you fell apart, that's true strength. --Christopher Reeves



An image from the in-progress Kickstarter film


Long, long ago I was a teacher. One of my students was Gary Dietz, young and lively--I remember he backpacked around Japan in that long ago and came back to us

Lovelessness and words

This morning I was thinking about writers and anger. In particular, I was thinking about a writer whose involvement in political causes has gone far to ruin her reputation as a thinker. Yet her books do well and suggest that what is called a push early in the publishing career is more important in finding readers than one's ideas.

I remember seeing her speak when I was around 20, and being

Cooperstown frolics

With illustrator-artist-writer Ruth Sanderson and Rebecca Beatrice Miller--at the Farmer's Museum--

Charlotte Mew, remembered--

I've been reading some Charlotte Mew. And you should too. Hardy and Woolf, Sassoon and Pound and others praised her highly. She had a sad life, but it had its sparky and luminous moments--that is, she wrote some lovely poems.

An introduction to Charlotte Mew here.
20 poems by her here.


In The Fields


Lord when I look at lovely things which pass,
Under old trees the shadow of young leaves

Wyeth women on art

Fenimore Art Museum



"I think all great stuff comes out of being alone. At the time you may feel lonely, but it's doing something wonderful to you."
    --Carolyn Wyeth

"A kind of tribute to my delight in life, in all kinds of important aspects of my life, and also the very superficial, the delightful, the charming, the nonessential, except that I never know what is nonessential. Nothing is

Golden frolics

I'm taking a blog break because Ruth Sanderson is coming for a visit, and I need to do a bit of spit and polish on the rickety old abode before this afternoon. If you don't know this wonderful illustrator and painter, take a look at her Golden Studio site. I'll be back on Monday. If you want to find me elsewhere, root around in old posts or check out the book tabs at the top of the page--the

Dawg poems

Quiz: There is a follow-up to the your-adjective-here New York Times Bestseller, I Could Pee on This. It is unusual to have poetry sell so well, so very well. Which is the correct response to this curious situation?

a. Little Old Proverb Woman's This too shall pass. 
b. Gandalf in angelic defender mode: You shall not pass! 
c. Keats, writing on water, saying, "A thing of beauty is a joy for

Body, not books--

I've always said the blog would be reserved for talk about words, poetry, and stories--the realm of books and literature. This post is not about books, except perhaps on the ability to carry a stack of them or pick up your O. E. D. as you grow older. Instead, it's what I wish somebody had said to me years ago. If someone you love is a woman or smallish man--particularly one who is slight, of

Happy birthday, Clive Hicks-Jenkins--

Cover image by Clive
P. S. Publishing, 2009 (out-of-print)



Cover, interior art by Clive.
Stanza Press, 2012




Jacket/interior art by Clive.
Phoenicia Publishing, 2012



Jacket image by Clive
Mercer University Press, 2011

Sendakian

I rose at 5:30 with Maurice Sendak on my mind. Now I realize it is his birthday. I am very glad Sendak was born and wielded his gift with such gaiety and care, and that he spoke so forcefully (and often grumpily) about his life and times.

So I rooted around, trying to find a quote I remembered about there being only good and bad books--none of this genre and "kinds" nonsense! (Probably it's