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Guilt

Jaywalking, making fun of someone, being found out

The Magic And The Power

An Interview With Odetta

I’m shy about writing, about exposing myself, but songs have come through me. Once, I was in Israel and had a hard night — an argument that was so unimportant I don’t even remember what it was about — and I decided I’d go to sleep. In those days that was the way I handled my problems. There’s a Chinese proverb that says if you have a big problem, and you need to solve it, go to sleep. The problem won’t disappear, but you’ll wake up in another position. (Chuckles.) Well, I got back to the hotel, and I couldn’t go to sleep. So I took pencil and paper in hand and out came a song. The kind of writing I admire involves yourself right out there, like Joni Mitchell. Her songs are about what she did or didn’t do or what she’s feeling. It’s almost like an exorcism. But I haven’t gotten there yet.

Adding On

Sunbeams

Newspapers are unable, seemingly, to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilization.

George Bernard Shaw

Breeds

We live in perilous times. All human beings have always lived in perilous times, but the perils of our times are our own and we know them well. For several years now, a sizable group of Americans have seen Indians — or the Indian way — as an approach to the diffusion of some peril.

Worth Fighting For

An Interview With Holly Near

I just got back from Nicaragua. I hadn’t known much at all about this country that the United States has been involved with for many years. The Marines were in Nicaragua as long ago as the Thirties. How can you live in a country and not know about a place where your Marines have been for that long?

Selected Poems

My Father’s Grandson

I called my father at his bank in Tulsa. He wasn’t there, as usual, so I left a message with his secretary, as usual. “Tell him, Helouise, that he has a new grandson.” I had to repeat the message twice, as Helouise was well aware that I was an only child and quite unmarried.

Black Reaper

We couldn’t have been more delighted, Buck and I, he in the warm arms of Mr. Boston, me in the warm arms of life in the sunny south, at a time when the shadows were hazy, the sunshine was bright, and the smell of the newly cropped bermuda grass touched my nostrils, and the days awaited me breathlessly, endlessly.

Theme For English 1200

“As a white person,” a student asks me, “are you uncomfortable teaching black literature to blacks?”

“Of course,” I answer. “Of course.”