Prose, Poetry, and Art since 1956
Kynna Lovin had the opportunity to interview Jay Ponteri about his new book, Someone Told Me, (Widow+Orphan House) a collection of essays that bridge the gaps between memoir, lyric essay, self-portraiture, and literary criticism. Via a shared Google Doc, the two discuss how this collection came to be born, how it found its body, and much more. Read Jay Ponteri’s essay, On Richard Linklater’s Boyhood…
I wish I could see the look on my face when I lied to Dad to get out of going to church. Or when my best childhood friend and I sat on swings in the neighborhood park the night before we began college at schools in different states. When my parents or siblings told me I cried too much. I wish I could see the…
Every night I touch my lips to her face, lower them into the cold water of the creek bed, the water pushing around my mouth, making my teeth ache, closest I ever get to being saved. No one’s turn in line behind me to press the button and drink, no shoulder tapping, sneakers shifting, knowing if I take too long, the preacher’s son, dressed too…
New York Times, October 24, 2019 LONDON —The 39 people found dead in a refrigerated truck trailer in southeastern England . . . . We don’t know much. The authorities said they were Chinese. Later, police said they were from a village in Vietnam. Probably seeking work in factories or construction or nail salons in Britain. We don’t know much but I…
Corn chips, on the cob, in a can, the mash-bill of his bourbon he was expecting, even the feed of cows turned steak, hamburger he ate no second thought, but then his soda, ketchup (all his condiments), and the cough syrup, taking it all down, a cornbread brain, his bones pureed, the once-detested creamed corn simmered, reduced to weight- bearing—kernels the new hemoglobin tumbling through…