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The City

Open-mike for poets, a small toy xylophone, a six-foot submarine sandwich

Sunbeams

I did not go to the Maggid of Mezeritch to learn Torah from him, but to watch him tie his boot laces.

A Hasidic rabbi

The Big Red Book

As Isaac Thomas walked jauntily down the bright, wide sidewalk at midday, he felt the weight of the book against his thigh, his wrist, the palm of his hand.

Law And Order

The most-feared policeman in the county, three-strikes defendants, an unforgettable Marshall

Six Days

The investigator from the department of mental health, Mr. D., called yesterday to tell me that the woman who seduced me after my stay on the K-4 unit a dozen years ago has been suspended from work for six days.

Raised By Cats

I took a deep breath. Whenever the ground is expecting, I like to walk. I can feel it reach right up through my legs to meet the sky. The blood of everything rises to meet the tension of the coming clouds before a good rain.

Holding Our Power

An Interview With Malidoma Patrice Somé

The indigenous world is not interested in the show of power. It is interested in respecting the source of the power. This respect is kept alive by camouflage; the power is protected by hiding it. An elder who has the power to create a light hole — a gateway you can jump through into another galaxy — is not interested in using that power to impress people. He would not use that power to show off.

Shame

After fourteen years of yard-walking a life sentence, Broadus Creek wore the mask of a traveler, implacably intent upon his route but thoroughly fortified against destination.

My Day In Court

I’d rather be at my desk, shuffling my own papers. But a friend confided recently that he couldn’t abide self-important types who considered themselves too busy for jury service.

Sunbeams

If Rosa Parks had moved to the back of the bus, you and I might never have heard of Dr. Martin Luther King.

Ramsey Clark