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Category Archives: Poetry
On Putting Powerful Tools in Unskilled Hands: Two Egregious Tendencies in Contemporary Poetry
NB: Several of the examples I use in this essay come from various essays by Randall Jarrell that I read years ago in my own wayward youth. If this were a scholarly piece, I would track those down and footnote … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Teaching Literature and Writing
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On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity [1] | Bob Shepherd
“Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?” –John 10:34 John,2 for all your skill, O master maker–singer, rhetor, builder, baker–you could not know, though multiply blest,that, choosing this name, you simply guessed,well, from … Continue reading
Posted in Philosophy, Poetry, Religion
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Two Late-night Thoughts about Poetry
Two thoughts, tonight, about poetry First, a theory of poetry and how it means: Perhaps the most important lesson that I received, in college, about reading poetry occurred on a day when, in a class on nineteenth-century American poets, I … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Teaching Literature and Writing
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Thank You Sonnet | Bob Shepherd
after Edna St. Vincent Millay Yes, it’s true, as you said, that after good sexthe world is heightened, clearer, a cineplex—as if a summer shower’s intercession washed clean the muddied, muddled doors of perception,but lest there be any misconstruction of … Continue reading
Posted in Love, Poetry, Sex and Gender
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Geometry: a Love Story | Bob Shepherd
“Imagination can . . . arrange for parallel lines to meet in secret.” –Shelley Jackson, on Italo Calvino Once upon a time, there were two parallel lines, and they couldn’t stop looking at one another. My lord. Such beauty, each … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Uncategorized
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Fact Check | Bob Shepherd
The fact that you even have to saythat Black Lives Matterand the fact that you do–you do have to say it. The fact that Putin and Trump The fact that if you tell peopleit’s about their freedom,it’s about their jobs,it’s … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Trump (Don the Con)
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On Learning that Hopkins Meant to Destroy His Own Poetry
for Diane Ravitch The great historian of education (and generally great all-round person) Diane Ravitch has written that her favorite poem is one by Gerard Manly Hopkins. So, I wrote this for her, about Hopkins, in Hopkins’s own style. The … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Teaching Literature and Writing
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Unholy Ghosts (Tis the Season)
This is a piece I wrote back early in December of 2018. Reprising it now because I never posted it here, and it’s important to remember, in this election season, the devastating toll that Trump’s maladministration has taken on our … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry, Trump (Don the Con)
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“O Donnie Boy,” aka “Moscow’s Asset Governing America” (MAGA),” aka Vlad’s Agent Orange
(to the tune of “Danny Boy) O Donnie Boy, your handler Putin’s calling, extending thanks for the Ukraine delay. He wants to say, impeachment’s surely galling, but still the tape won’t see the light of day. But come ye back … Continue reading
Posted in Humor, Poetry, Trump (Don the Con)
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Bob Shepherd | Praxis 