“I’m keen on Rebecca Solnit’s collection of essays, Encyclopedia of Trouble and Spaciousness because she writes so beautifully about everything from Arctic exploration to Thoreau.” - Rhianna
Rebecca Solnit is one of our 25 Women to Read Before You Die.
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WEEKEND WILDCARD
Shady lady
Mr. Rogers is a perfect example of doing something small and easy to accommodate those with a disability or making someone more comfortable that makes all the difference to them
Àngel Planells. La Señora Impúdica. 1933.
By George Sowden tha gawd, 1983
Sean Woodrow & David Corns
editor: Top toast post, back by popular demand…
30 Days of Poetry, Day 10: Listen to NYPL’s Thomas Knowlton read from David Berman’s poem “Self-portrait at 28.”
The Book of Miracles, Augsburg, c. 1550.
camo cats
Landays: Poetry of Afghan Women
A landay has only a few formal properties. Each has twenty-two syllables: nine in the first line, thirteen in the second. The poem ends with the sound “ma” or “na.” Sometimes they rhyme, but more often not. In Pashto, they lilt internally from word to word in a kind of two-line lullaby that belies the sharpness of their content, which is distinctive not only for its beauty, bawdiness, and wit, but also for the piercing ability to articulate a common truth about war, separation, homeland, grief, or love.
Excerpts:
“Separation, you set fire in the heart and home of every lover.”
“You sold me to an old man, father. May God destroy your home, I was your daughter.”
“My love gave his life for our homeland. I’ll sew his shroud with one strand of my hair.”
“I dream I am the president. When I awake, I am the beggar of the world.”
“My lover is fair as an American soldier can be. To him I looked dark as a Talib, so he martyred me.”
“I could have tasted death for a taste of your tongue, watching you eat ice cream when we were young.”
Read the full article about Landays folk poetry by women in Afghanistan that was collected by Pulitzer Center grantees Eliza Griswold and Seamus Murphy for the Poetry Foundation.
All Images by Seamus Murphy between November 1994 and December 2012.
Sam Cooke Is Yours
