Apr 13

The Injured Deer, Pt. II

A little over two years ago, in January, I wrote a covid-adjacent poem about a gimpy deer we’d see from time to time in our backyard. A...

Apr 9

A Very Personal Perspective on Poetry Month

Nice that they call April Poetry Month (also Autism Month and Occupational Therapy Month among who knows how many other designations). In...

Dec 30, 2023

Cribbing from the Master

Thanks to our phones, all of us are photographers now, and that means we carry with us, all the time, a tool to make pictures that are...

Oct 28, 2023

This Week’s Domestic Massacre

The Maine shooter, a trained marksman, was hearing voices and targeting his National Guard unit when their commander had him hospitalized...

Oct 22, 2023

Circle Game

Eventually, one imagines, we will understand why Hamas attacked Israel, though they had to know from experience what the end result would...

Oct 17, 2023

Old Friends, New Press!

Remarkable that in the past two weeks The New Yorker has profiled not one but two of my old friends, both long-toiling authors who have...

Nov 23, 2022

Fave Books of 2022

Looking back at the year so far, it seems to have passed with as much writing and editing as reading, which I suppose is a good thing....

Jan 4, 2022

2022? Whew….

At dawn on New Year’s Day a year ago, the phone rang to tell us that my wife Chris’ 99-year old grandmother Angelina had died just before...

Nov 20, 2021

Ten Favorite Books of 2021

Halfway through 2021, I retired from teaching at VCU and set out on whatever this next chapter may bring. The books listed here (only...

Oct 7, 2021

Yazoo Ho! Day Five – Headed Home

I’m tired and aching for our bed at home, exactly how you hope to feel at the end of any trip. Waving so long to Roz, I nose the little...

Oct 6, 2021

Yazoo Ho! A Deep South travelogue: Day Four

Any day now, any day now, I shall be released. I pack and slip out of the Steele Cottage at 7, having finished every crumb of that...

Oct 4, 2021

Yazoo Ho! A Deep South Travelogue – Day Three

Living in New Orleans back in the day taught me that the tastiest (and most affordable) cuisine can be found in dives, Mom and Pop shacks...

Oct 2, 2021

Yazoo Ho! Sidebar: Mississippi Memory

Forty years ago, my pal John Wahl and I drove up Highway 61 from New Orleans to Memphis on a blues pilgrimage of sorts. John was my only...

Sep 28, 2021

Yazoo Ho! A Deep South Travelogue – Part Two

So I remember every face/of every man who put me here. BnB breakfast at Steele Cottage is served down the street at the Big House at 8:30...

Sep 24, 2021

Yazoo Ho! My 5-day 2000-mile drive across the Deep South – an essay

“They say everything can be replaced/They say every distance is not near.” In February 2020, I visited my friend Corey in the federal...

Aug 14, 2021

Amnesia – Our Super Power & Our Kryptonite: Thoughts on the U.S. War in Afghanistan

An illustration accompanying today’s Washington Post article about the debacle in Afghanistan shows a friend of ours, a 19-year old...

Jun 20, 2021

How Some Dads I Know Spent the Past Year

On Mother’s Day, made a list of some things moms I know went through in the year of Covid. So, doing the same for the guys here on...

Feb 22, 2021

February – The Longest Month

Why is it that February, our shortest month, always seems the longest? And this year, as we round toward the first anniversary of the...

Jan 13, 2021

How Things Are Now

A year ago, our grandmother Angelina (Ann) Segno, then age 98, began to have difficulty walking. For several years, she had lived in a...

Nov 20, 2020

“By the Book” Self-Own

My friend and author Rosemary Rawlins asked me to share an anecdote or two for her book club, which I’ll be joining in December for a...

Prose & Verse

Reading my Writing

The Birdman of Central Park - a story

00:00 / 15:28

River Shadows - a poem

00:00 / 00:50

Love Goes to Buildings on Fire - a poem

00:00 / 03:15

Reading from The Night Doctor of Richmond - Book People bookshop June 8, 2024

00:00 / 19:49

Videos & Photography

The Dazzlement - a poem

A poem based on a photograph of kids at Fork Union Baptist Church Sunday School, 1960.

WPFW-FM On the Margin interview with E. Ethelbert Miller discussing The Night Doctor of Richmond

Prose & Verse

Reading my Writing

Videos & Photography

The Dazzlement - a poem

Radio Interview