Culver City's Poetess Laureate shares a poem in honor of our veterans.
Not Only Do We Grow Older, So Does Our Memory
Editor’s Note: Linda Ferrara (lindaferrara@aol.com) is one of our favorite readers. After reading to her granddaughter the other evening, she forwarded this abbreviated but appreciated missive: “For you Mensa kids. I quoted this as Emily Dickenson’s work to Eileen tonight. Memory not so good!!”
Poetry Saved Her Life
I find that I am doing more meditation than ever. It seems to refocus my mind and provide some relief. Of course, the poetry is a form of meditation for me. I keep on writing. Vice Mayor Mehaul O’Leary brought up the idea of naming me the poet laureate.
Edgy Art Exhibit Opens This Week at West L.A. College
Supreme Court Justice Porter Stewart famously said, “I know [pornography] when I see it.” “Slightly Scandalous,” an art exhibition opening Thursday in the FineArts Gallery on the campus of West Los Angeles College, showcases 10 well-known Los Angeles artists who titillate and deal with eroticism. Sometimes they walk the fine line of what Justice Stewart’s “it” is.
Racing to the Future While Chained to the Past
A review of Fanon for Beginners, by Deborah Wyrick Ph.D. If we are to believe the commentariat, the best experts on race in America are white men – the same folks who, coincidentally, are also experts on women. The good news expounded by these experts, whose expertise rests in being experts more so than anything resembling social science, is ably summed up by …
Attempting to Tame an Ego
How about moving off the center,
Into the corner or to the side?
A Bloody Exciting Experience That Rhymes
The overnight total lunar eclipse, last night and this morning, reminded me of a poem I wrote in April when we could see the eclipse — the Blood Moon — and Mars …
Is There Really Any “Good” in the Good Book?
A review of The Ethics of the Faith: Right, Wrong, and the God of Abraham. Ean Burchell is not the first to offer remedial Bible studies to people who might not have paid enough attention to the so-called “Good Book” the first time around. Ben Akerley provided a look the Bible’s sordid sexuality in The X-Rated Bible, while Edward Falzon satirically paraphrased the Pentateuch in his provocative broadside, Being Gay Is Disgusting, Or God Loves the Smell of Burning Fat. The difference between this latest addition to an already crowded library shelf and those previous volumes, other than a distinct lack of humour, is a specific project for evaluating the ethical merits of the God (arguably) common to the Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Setting aside empirical and ontological considerations, Burchell asks, “…does faith in Yahweh really offer us the only road to ethical relationships with our families, friends and neighbors?”
We Think Differently Than They Do
And none of them was white.
And none of them wondered what was the purpose…
They were all taken by an instinct. They were being directed by something that was beyond their ability of understanding.
The Hollow Hollywood
Night. Closing coffee shops. Opening bars. Broadway. People – couples and lonely strangers. Loud cars. Red light. Yellow light. No rules. The evening air complements tourists with a free smell of fresh weed (it’s all included). The smell of American freedom. Beautiful girls (maybe guys) are innocently fixing their tights in the middle of the street, glancing at the dark windows of passing cars. Everything and everybody doing its routine. The usual Hollywood evening.