Our mothers worked insoot furnaces late into nightsuntil their skins became reflections of the firebefore them.They patted their blistered handswith lavender oil and honeybefore the morning began — yet againthey would disappear into their small factorieslike little glowwormsin the sun-streaked woods.Our mothers chopped and cookedpots of curry in the hours between.They tied our hair up... Continue Reading →
The author of A Dangerous Energy expands upon his outlook, methods and future works.
He left one day without saying goodbye.I cherished the moments that we shared.He must have known my heart would wail and cry.I wonder at the end if he was scared.I wish I could take back that canceled lunch,I mourn for those who missed time with him too.Instead I told him something else came up.He did... Continue Reading →
My grandad’s father John Speed Stephens Jr. was the son of an Irish immigrant, and as a fourteen-year-old, he became the pioneer who planted the Stephens in Indian territory, pre-Oklahoma. This is his story, passed on by my father, born in Palmer, Oklahoma. Many of the details were told to...
Margaret Hagerman spent years in the wilds of privileged white America, talking with kids, going to their soccer games, etc. in order to produce White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege in a Racially Divided America. Working in the Midwestern burg of “Peterfield” (one suspects Minneapolis or Milwaukee), she focuses on...
My daughter has my hurt in her. She lives with it better than I have. I hid it, softened it, made it acceptable, and then called my compromise a success. An achievement of normal. She faces it, endures it, mocks it by parody, dismissal, lightness. No big deal. It is...
In September 2019, I took a group of students to the annual Prairie Festival at The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas, as part of my effort to introduce them to some genuinely radical thinking regarding environmental sustainability, local food systems, and the cultural shifts necessary to make them happen. Afterward...
Margaret Hagerman spent years in the wilds of privileged white America, talking with kids, going to their soccer games, etc. in order to produce White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege in a Racially Divided America. Working in the Midwestern burg of “Peterfield” (one suspects Minneapolis or Milwaukee), she focuses on...
It’s hard to be a city at night, sleeping along this big river. So much wakes youfrom slumber—mill whistles, sirens, dogs barking, people falling up anddown stairs, babies crying to be fed or changed, couples in bedrooms or carsmaking loud love. When it comes down to it, I wake even when doors slamand when people... Continue Reading →
Ishmael Reed is back in the news these days. The writer, now eighty-one years old, got national attention for his latest play, The Haunting of Lin-Manuel Miranda. Most of the headlines of pieces on the play are some variation of “Ishmael Reed Does Not Like Hamilton,” and indeed he does...
