Day 5 of the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing…teaching my workshops Flash Away and Welcoming Surprises, then faculty Dinner at Oak Bluff’s Black Joy Kitchen followed by the traditional late night visit to Back Door Donuts!
Day 4 of the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing…manuscript conferences with tons of awesome writers (not pictured 😀) followed by a faculty trip to Menemsha for sunset lobsters and then fog fog lighthouse fog fog!
Day 3 of the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing…talking over manuscripts with writers at the Vineyard Arts Project and hearing the evening readings by the wonderful Hannah Bae and the wonderful Jackson Brown!
Oh, just 3 alumni from Indiana University’s MFA in Creative Writing strolling along the night-time docks in Edgartown on Martha’s Vineyard: Alexander Weinstein, Jackson Brown, and yours truly!
Day 2 of the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing…exploring Edgartown, then giving my poetry reading tonight alongside the wonderful Vogue Robinson!
With a “skol” and a raised glass of elderflower wine Director Alexander Weinstein opens the first week of The Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing 2026 Summer Conference. I’m teaching here for my 13th year, alongside Alexander, Hannah Bae, Vogue Robinson, and Jackson Brown! Here’s to a week of writing on the Vineyard!!!Â
Here’s a short interview with me published in the literary magazine of Uskudar American Academy in Istanbul, Türkiye. A 12th grader there found my poem “Our Beautiful Life When It’s Filled with Shrieks” and reached out to me from across the many waters. It’s amazing what poetry can do. Thank you to Efe OÄŸuz AktaÅŸ for these lovely questions. My poem and I are humming with gratitude.
A few weeks ago I received an email out of the blue from the Head Librarian at the Uskudar American Academy in Istanbul, Türkiye, letting me know that 12th graders there were reading and excited about my poem “Our Beautiful Life When It’s Filled with Shrieks” which has a line in it about people who bicycled across Turkey in the late 1800s. They are going to translate my poem into Turkish for their school magazine alongside an interview with me. I am sending them this signed copy of my second book for their library. My little dedication doesn’t come close to expressing the deep deep joy this connection across the seas has brought to my heart.
I’m reading online for the Cobalt Poets series next week, May 12 at 10:30 pm Eastern. Stay up late! Do crimes! Then tune in to hear me read and then maybe read something yourself at the open reading that follows me lipping off!
Thank you to the Artisan Gallery in Binghamton New York for hanging the text pf my poem “Birds and Stars Suite” as part of their April gallery show. What a delight to be asked to be a part of this. The show is not longer up, but if you want you can read the poem online at Blackbird: an online journal of literature and the arts:
https://blackbird.vcu.edu/birds-stars-suite/