Blog

Joyce Peseroff’s “A Visit to the Smash Room”

Joyce Peseroff’s “A Visit to the Smash Room”

A Visit to the Smash Roomby Joyce PeseroffDonated TVs, microwaves,printers, trophies, vases on tables. Baseball bats and mauls ready by the wall. $50/hr to playwith your boyfriend or alonewhen it’s hard to be a goodMom during the workday, gas up the...

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Getting to Know Cammy Thomas & her new book Tremors

Getting to Know Cammy Thomas & her new book Tremors

When did you first encounter poetry?  How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? The first time I remember poetry making a deep impression on me was when I had the measles at age eight. My mother had them along with me, and we lay in her bed with...

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Ellen Steinbaum’s “Summer 2021 Cicadas”

Ellen Steinbaum’s “Summer 2021 Cicadas”

Summer 2021 Cicadas Ellen Steinbaum They’re my last cicadas, though who can be sure, of course. Given my age and their infrequent outings,like scheduled comets and eclipses, they could be penultimate, but most likely my concluding swarm. Every seventeen...

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The Hard Work of Justice

The Hard Work of Justice

In light of recent events, this week’s issue of The Hard Work of Hope will be a little different. We are always trying to offer poems that meet the moment, and the current crisis in Haiti—along with its long history of instability and the United States’ involvement in...

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Meet the September U35 Readers

Meet the September U35 Readers

Elisa Rowe What is most important to your writing process? Doubt and wonder, equally.  What about you comes across most in your writing? Maybe my sensitivity? To emotions, experiences, objects, how my senses process the world and the way it shapes me in big and...

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Jill McDonough’s “Cindy Comes To Hear Me Read”

Jill McDonough’s “Cindy Comes To Hear Me Read”

Cindy Comes To Hear Me Read by Jill McDonoughCindy: not her real name. I met herin prison, and people in prison I givethe fake names. I taught her Shakespeare, rememberher frown, wide eyes, terror of gettingthings wrong. Her clear, arguable thesison Desdemona’s...

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Sarah Del’s “Dreamed Wedding”

Sarah Del’s “Dreamed Wedding”

Dreamed Weddingby Sarah Delice melts in boot treadsdrips onto the floor  forming a puddle below the high table in the bar area empty, save for twograndparents, a six year-old...

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Laura Rodley’s “Groundhog”

Laura Rodley’s “Groundhog”

Groundhogby Laura RodleyThe groundhog’s fur is silver, silkily rippling in the windas she chomps ends of grasses, clover, not yet have I seen her eat anything that causes consternation;she has scoured the walking path festoonedwith acorns that have...

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