April 02 2015
For this Easter weekend I’ll be posting poems which are nonets or reverse nonets. A nonet is a French poetry form consisting of 9 lines with the syllable count descending from 9 to 1. A reverse nonet has 9 lines with the syllable count increasing from 1 to 9. I chose this form for the […]
April 01 2015
April is National Poetry Month, so I’ll be posting a poem here on my blog every day. Some of the poems will be ones that I’ve written myself. Some will be poems from poets who are just a little bit more well known than myself. This first poem is the theme poem of There Are […]
February 27 2015
In January I had the opportunity to hear Stephen King speak at a fundraiser for the Manatee Public Library in Bradenton, Florida. King spends his winters on a nearby island and had donated his time. My first thought when he came out on stage was that he was taller than I had imagined. […]
January 20 2015
I’m spending a few weeks escaping the cold and snow and visiting my old friend, Walt Disney. Walt sure knew how to tell a story. As I’m enjoying walking around the world or worlds he created, I’m impressed again by how simple his stories are. Whether the setting is a midieval castle, an African plain, […]
December 30 2014
With all the family gatherings, the Christmas season is a great time for storytelling. It’s only natural to reminisce about Christmases past or just other childhood memories as we get together with distant relatives, who we may not see more than once a year. Storytelling helps us remember who we are and from whence we came. And then […]
November 26 2014
Every once in awhile I get discouraged with the writing life and decide to quit. No more books, no more poems, no more blog. Then, just as I’m about to turn my latest manuscript into rabbit cage liner, something happens to make me stop the shredder and get out the scotch tape. I had one […]
November 03 2014
Evan, almost three, and Molly, two, started to get the hang of Halloween this year. They liked dressing up in their costumes (Buzz Lightyear and owl), and they liked running from house to house saying, “Trick or Treat.” But their favorite thing to do was to dump out the candy they’d received, play around with […]
October 18 2014
Every once in a while, the mess in my writing room overwhelms me, and I just have to straighten it up before I can do any work. I always feel guilty about letting it get so bad and swear that I will keep it tidy from then on. You know the rest of the story. After a […]
September 16 2014
Foreshadowing is a literary device that gives the reader a hint of what’s to come in a story. Merriam-Webster defines foreshadow as “to represent, indicate or typify beforehand; prefigure.” Many times it serves to prepare the reader for bad news. The character who coughs on page 10, may be dead by page 100. The Bible […]
September 09 2014
Most people mark the end of summer with Labor Day and back to school. But for me, summer’s not really over until after the Clothesline Art Show. The weather is oftentimes perfect, not too cold like the Lilac Festival and not too hot like Corn Hill. And it has the most creative and most professional […]