Poet’s Corner: At the Water’s Edge
At the Water's Edge
By Eloise Jones
You stand by the water’s edge
Close enough to feel the slap of salty water against your knees
Smell the brine in the air
Hear the steady tempo of the waves
And you...
Driven by inequality
As the daughter of a doctor who received his medical training in the Jim Crow days of the early 1950s, I found the parallels between his and Dr. Stanford’s experiences astounding and, sadly, not...
Poet’s Corner: Swim
Swim
By Valerie Sonnenthal
today writing a poem
feels like an imposition
my mind wanders
after a swim
pond to myself
under cover of hazy gray
held by the mother spirit
back in the womb
each afternoon
in tune with old strokes
restrictions melt away
pleasure in...
Islanders Write
I was sitting on the front porch of Edgartown Books making small talk and signing copies of my novel on the Sunday afternoon that Joe Biden announced he wouldn’t be running for reelection. Phones...
Endings and beginnings
Memoir is rooted in memory, and Honor Moore’s new book, “A Termination,” dwells in its allusive and kaleidoscopic nature.
The termination she speaks of is an abortion, which she had in 1969 at age 23...
Poet’s Corner: You Know What I Mean
You Know What I Mean
By Seán McMahon
Walking up Music Street
In West Tisbury
All is good in the hood
And if I could, then I would
Kiss all the cute little fat babies I meet
‘Cause I feel like...
Have bears, will travel
When I was a kid I wrote stories, accompanied by illustrations, and bound them together with staples and Elmer’s Glue. I desperately wanted to get a book published but I didn’t know how to...
‘The New Brownies Book: A Love Letter to Black Families’
There are some books that you want, and there are some that you just have to have. Scholar Dr. Karida L. Brown and awardwinning artist Charly Palmer’s stunning publication, “The New Brownie’s Book: A...
Poet’s Corner: Island Roads
Island Roads
By Jeffrey Agnoli
Beamers, rovers
beaters, dreamers
twenty-first century
machines roam the roads
across this piece of radiance
amidst the Atlantic.
Paths once traversed
by much earlier humans
nobler and saner
walking in lines
of earth energy
the Mother laid out
before time.
Multidimensional
roads that still remain
offering...
Islanders Write
This summer’s Islanders Write will kick off on Sunday, August 18, at 7:30 pm, with a discussion about “Finding Truth in a Post-Truth Era.” With conspiracy theories, scams, deceptions, lies, collective amnesia, false narratives...
When life gets in the way
Kate Feiffer’s delicious new novel, “Morning Pages,” drops us straight into the intimate life and mind of her artfully wry-humored protagonist.
Elise is facing a problem — well, a few of them, truthfully. The novel...
Around the bookstore: Summer, a time for catching up …
Well, it’s here, July in all its glory. Back in January, it seemed so far away, so far as to be unimaginable, a chronological distance that would take forever to cross. And now, forever...
Fun with friends
For those of us who are a certain age, the thought of paper dolls brings back fond childhood memories. I was no Barbie and Ken lover, but paper dolls, which can easily be cut...
Poet’s Corner: Times of conflict
Times of conflict
By Cecily Bryant
I think such hard times tend to
draw the succor from the breadth of souls
Spread from those with everything
to those with nothing
For what human being can not imagine the
bleeding of a...
Islanders Write
There was a shocking bit of publishing misinformation making the rounds a while back. It had to do with the number of books an author could expect to sell. We all know that not...
Poet’s Corner: I hear America crying
I hear America crying
By Valerie Sonnenthal
I hear America crying
tears that cannot be wiped
away on television screens
monitors emphasize
what is magnified
lies on display
like a hit parade
who can top this
does anything matter
anymore anything
not death or deploy
let others...
Patricia J. Williams ponders ‘The Miracle of the Black Leg’
Patricia J. Williams, legal scholar, former Nation magazine columnist, and frequent Island visitor, offers a genre-exploding journey. “The Miracle of the Black Leg: Notes on Race, Human Bodies, and the Spirit of the Law”...
Islanders Write: On pitch
Last week during a book talk at the Chilmark library, someone asked me how I found a publisher for my novel. It’s a question I often get asked, as finding an agent and publisher...
By the books
The literary arts are thriving this summer at Featherstone Center for the Arts. The program officially began in the summer of 2019, when Justen Ahearn could no longer house the Noepe Center for Literary...
Poet’s Corner: Writing Workshop
Writing Workshop
By Beki Test
they say the moon doesn’t belong in a poem
you have written The moon is sometimes male
no one knows what you mean
its grad school and everyone feels superior
they roll their eyes and...